Echoes of Shambhala
by Milareppa
Summary: The Tok'ra lose a science team looking for the lost Kingdom of Shambhala. SG1 must mount a rescue to find them but in doing so leave behind one of their own who is himself in desperate need. [Ch18&19 added]
1. One Ancient Road

Notes:

Although this is based after "Full Circle" and would therefore make it Season 7, it's AU because I hadn't seen Season 7 when I came up with this story and started writing it. I also tend to avoid spoilers, so I don't know what's going to be happening in the canonical Stargate universe. I do know that Daniel Descends with memory loss. That's all I know so if you haven't seen Season 7, this story should still be readable. However, I do reference Season 1-6 episodes heavily during the course of this story.

--------

"Oh yeah. We're in Kansas alright" O'Neill muttered as he slid to a stop at the top of the dusty embankment and stared down at the plateau below him. So far, nothing about this mission had gone to plan and he had only been here for 15 minutes.

__

You were expecting something different this time? It's Tok'ra organised for crying out loud. He shook his head and looked over his shoulder. He held Selmak to a higher standard than other Tok'ra. His current host had been a General in the US Air Force, after all. "You'd think it would count for _something_" he muttered, exasperated.

Jacob gave him a steady, challenging stare as he caught up, recognising the look on the Colonel's face even if he hadn't heard the words. Whatever quip the Tok'ra was about to unleash, however, froze on his lips as he stared past O'Neill at the scene before him. He glanced at the Colonel, wordlessly.

"Kansas" O'Neill offered, dryly.

The responding sigh was double-toned and distorted. Selmak. O'Neill gave him a challenging stare of his own but it was Jacob who glared right back. Apparently symbiote and host were united against the Colonel this time so he silently turned his attention to the rest of SG-1 as they finally reached the top and paused to catch their breath.

"Oh my" Carter commented as she took in the sight below her.

"Are we sure this isn't some kind of battle zone?" Quinn asked, staring.

"There do not appear to be signs of weapons discharge, Jonas Quinn" Teal'c observed, eyes narrowed against the dull cloudy sky as he scanned the landscape quickly. 

The Kelownan's eyes narrowed as he took in the scene before him again but it was Carter who spoke up. "Possibly a natural disaster. The ship's scans indicated tectonic instabilities in the region. There's a high concentration of pyroclast in the atmosphere consistent with recent geothermal activity"

O'Neill grunted a mild protest at her scientific rambling and she paused expectantly. Surprisingly, he didn't ask her to stop or clarify anything she had just said. Instead he was scanning back the way they had come, towards their small scout ship that had skidded to an untidy stop in the dusty, eroded soil a quarter of a mile away. Between that ship and this hill, they had see no animal life and no people. The soil was so dry it could have been sand. A monotonous, dirty, grey-brown sand.

Ahead of them, however, were signs of life - skeletal ghosts of trees, bushes that managed to cling to a few brown, rotting husks that had once been leaves; wispy strands of yellow-brown reeds that had probably originally been succulent green grass. It might have been scenic once - the plateau set against a backdrop of rugged mountains, wrapped in a light purple haze that must have been beautiful in their starkness and majesty but which were now hulking brown monsters leering in the distant ashy fog.

O'Neill dropped his gaze back to the rubble. There had been buildings here once, stone buildings. Temples, the Tok'ra archaeologists had told the SGC, perhaps similar to the ones found in the Himalayas Jacob had added for O'Neill's benefit. This had been the first statement of the mission that had irritated the Colonel and unfortunately, not the last. O'Neill didn't have the chance to compare, however. The buildings were shattered ruins. It was hard for his untrained eye to see exactly what the architecture had looked like when intact.

He turned to Jacob. "Okay, take us to 'em" he said shortly. Jacob nodded silently and led the way carefully down the hill, following a flattened path that had seen heavy, recent activity. Despite Teal'c's observation, he shifted his gun into a more accessible position, and heard Carter do the same. In front of him, he noticed that Jacob had already pulled free his zat gun. The Tok'ra wasn't taking any chances either.

As they reached the ruins, O'Neill slowed down and quickly gestured to the group behind him. On his signal, Carter split off, taking Teal'c and Quinn with her while the Colonel, accompanied by Jacob, moved off to a jagged pillar that had been part of a much longer wall, scanning the area warily.

He frowned. Still nothing. Not even Carter's team was detectable now, as if the ground itself had swallowed them up. Shaking off his unease at the unnatural stillness, he cautiously began to move into the first building. He didn't need to check on Jacob's progress. The Tok'ra host's military experience exceeded O'Neill's. He knew the drill too well to create unpredictable difficulties. Not like some others that O'Neill could have named. 

As he silently reached for his flashlight and altered his grip to better control both gun and light, he found himself thinking of Kheb. There was something familiar about this layout, a ghost of sensation that made him uncomfortable. 

__

The sense of impending doom as the Jaffa march out of the night to attack the sanctuary. Outnumbered, he fortifies the temple and prepares to batten down the hatches. There's no way in hell the Jaffa will take him_ down quietly._

He stepped abruptly around the bend in the wall, gun cocked, light scanning. Broken tiles on the floor, a shattered stool and the remains of a pillar. Assured the room was clear, he nodded curtly to Jacob and moved on, discovering the pattern repeated as he explored. 

The breeze ruffled his hair as it brought with it the stale scent of burned-out embers. He froze briefly; senses peeled for danger or activity and felt, rather than heard, Jacob do the same.

__

Behind him, Daniel Jackson's urgent voice carries across the tense stillness that has descended, beseeching him to lower his weapons, that everything will be alright as long as he complies.

Finding none, O'Neill looked out across the dirt road to the buildings on the other side and noticed Carter signalling that all was clear at her end.

__

Trusting Daniel, he signals his team to obey and as he looks up, darkness crosses the moon, electricity builds and clouds roll. 

Signalling an all clear himself, he stepped out into the road and the two groups met in the middle of the complex.

"Nothing, sir" Carter announced. "Abandoned ruins"

__

There's a sudden explosion of white light and the stench of burned flesh on the wind. The tension breaks with the weather, and suddenly... it's over.

"Oma 1, Jaffa 0"

"Sir?" 

O'Neill blinked as he found himself the centre of attention and realised he had spoken those last thoughts out loud. He looked into Carter's expressive blue eyes, noticing the sudden mix of concern and puzzlement that was there. 

__

Daniel... shoes.

O'Neill flashed her an irritated smile.

"It does indeed have many similarities to Kheb" Teal'c's voice was soft. They all glanced his way and found him staring at O'Neill. The Colonel's retort died on his lips at the oddly sombre expression in the dark eyes, startled that the Jaffa seemed so able to understand his current bleak mood. 

Dropping Teal'c's gaze quickly, he changed the subject. "So, no Tok'ra then?"

"No sign of them, sir" Carter moved past the odd moment with her usual efficiency and frowned. "No sign of habitation, research or violence. They may as well have not been here, sir."

"What were the Tok'ra doing here again?" Quinn asked. He was frowning. Carter's eyebrows rose quizzically. She knew that expression. It always appeared on the Kelownan's face when he was trying to see the big picture but had realised that there were important pieces of the jigsaw missing.

"When the Tau'ri finally decided to share intelligence on the location of Kheb, the High Council realised it bore a similar description of some other places that our people had encountered over the years" Selmak replied. "With Kheb abandoned there was nothing for us to learn from the Ancients directly, although as Doctor Jackson reported, the writings were indeed an interesting, if not puzzling, approach to Ascension"

"Did they mean anything to you?" Carter asked.

"Unfortunately not, although we are working on it. Anise hopes they will give us insight into how a Goa'uld could have Ascended. Our archaeologists believe this is Shambhala, a sanctuary with a similar purpose to Kheb. So far, all that has been found is pottery that the Tok'ra have been unable to make sense of and evidence of primitive musical instruments"

Quinn was nodding. "I wondered about that. There aren't any writings here" he gestured back to buildings he had been exploring. "At least not over there" he glanced at O'Neill who frowned impatiently at him and continued quickly. "Well, if Kheb and this place were built for a similar purpose, wouldn't it stand to reason there were writings? Pottery is useful to archaeologists but it won't help if that's all that's been found" he shrugged. "So far I've seen no writing, no art, just broken bowls, sticks and furniture. If this is a place of learning.... where's the learning?"

O'Neill raised an eyebrow and looked expectantly at Carter. She looked taken aback. "I'm not an archaeologist, sir" she glanced at her father who bowed his head.

"It's the problem the Tok'ra have been running into" Jacob commented thoughtfully. "They were pretty much ready to abandon this place when we lost contact with them."

"What have they found so far?" Quinn asked. "I haven't even seen anywhere their finds were stored yet"

Jacob pointed up the dirt track. "A building near the Stargate. Just up there" he started to move off but was halted by O'Neill's indignant voice.

"Woah! Stargate? _What_ Stargate?!"

"The one that's just up there, Jack" Jacob replied innocently and picked up the pace again. 

Scowling, O'Neill fell into step with him. "You told us there was no Stargate" he snapped.

"Selmak told you the planet was unreachable by Stargate" Jacob corrected, dryly.

"And...?"

"And that's because the Stargate here doesn't seem to work. We don't know why. It doesn't have a DHD"

"What about manual dial or alternate energy sources, Dad? The SGC doesn't use a DHD either" Carter reminded him.

Jacob rounded the bend in the road and stopped. "See for yourself, Sam"

The bend in the road corresponded to a bend in the plateau itself, and as the rest of the plateau came into view, they could see the road came to an abrupt end at the foot of the local Stargate. Some distance away from the Stargate was a stone cottage although it was in ruins just like the rest of the buildings they had seen. The Stargate itself was set in a peculiar dais that appeared to be made out of the same material as the Stargate itself and from this distance appeared to be pitted and scarred by some kind of impact damage. Carter studied the area thoughtfully. There was no sign of any DHD and from where she was standing, she couldn't see any sign of there ever having been one.

Teal'c was the first to move forward, approaching the Stargate with a slight frown on his face. "Major Carter" he said suddenly and picked up his pace.

The Major hurried to catch up and the pair were already examining the Stargate closely by the time the others arrived. O'Neill paused, watching them all for several moments as Jacob and Quinn joined them, then made a decision. Leaving the others to do their work, he began to move towards the cottage, his ever-suspicious mind shifting into overdrive as he debated the ease at which this area could be defended should they still be walking into a trap.


	2. Driftwood

****

Chapter 2

Voices murmured in the stairwell below the floor. Normally, he might not have noticed, but the room was so silent, every little sound was exacerbated. The faint metallic grinding of a computer hard-drive hovered on the edge of consciousness; the whisper of booted feet on solid flooring through metal doors in the distance; and the powerful hissing of a soldering iron as engineers effected repairs in the huge room that was visible through the glass behind him.

He sat with his back to the Stargate, hands folded loosely on the table in front of him, head bowed, seeing only his fingers as they nervously twined and untwined around each other.

How he had let SG-1 talk him into bringing him to this place, he didn't know. He couldn't frame it words exactly, it had been more of a feeling, a sense that he should trust these people, that they would have done anything to prevent him being hurt more than he had already been. But since he had followed them here and they had left again through the Stargate for destinations unknown to him, he was no longer certain he had made the right decision.

Left to his own devices, except when the facility's doctor required his presence, he had been assigned a room that was as stark, grey and bare as the rest of this underground complex he was confined to. At first, he had walked the corridors he was allowed access to often and aimlessly, trying to learn their layout, trying to find some sense of belonging, a whisper of familiarity that would reassure him that SG-1 had been telling him the truth when they said this was his home, this was where he belonged.

He had soon given up that activity, however, and now only left his room when he had to.

It was certainly true that everyone here knew his face. That much he had learned quickly. Every time he walked the corridors, strangers would turn to stare at him. Conversations would stop abruptly whenever he walked into a room, then start up again as soon as they thought he was out of earshot. Every time the topic of conversation was him. He was dead. He was an impostor. He was a Trojan Horse sent to betray the SGC. He was a miracle, risen from the dead to walk once more among the living, like a fallen angel.

__

Biblical or popular culture? He wondered morosely, turning his hands over to stare at his palms. Then his shoulders stiffened as he wondered where exactly that thought had come from. Popular culture was something he had heard the people around him refer to when talking about TV but he wasn't so certain what the Bible was nor was he sure of the difference between the two. 

His teeth ground slightly in frustration, feeling the pressure in his temples building. There were times when he thought his head was going to explode. He could feel it lurking in the back of his mind, like a chained and faceless monster. Its hot breath tickled the back of his mind like an itch he couldn't scratch, its claws scraped lines of searing agony through his skull as he fought to break down the walls that stopped him from the seeing the truth. The worst part of not knowing the truth had to be this monster in his mind - the scent of it in the dark recesses of his thoughts, its chilling howl that tormented his dreams when he tried to sleep, and its constant mutterings, like the whispers of damned souls. He was frightened of it and yet he courted it. He was reviled by it and yet he egged it on. He didn't want to face it and yet he was desperate to know what it was. Was it friend or foe? Was it the key to who he was or a red herring sent to keep him forever in the dark?

He sank his head into his arms, resting his forehead on the table lightly. Doctor Fraiser had told him he had to want to remember for it to happen and as he sat there in the room alone, he faced the honest and monstrous truth. He didn't know if he wanted to remember. What if he was something awful? What if there were secrets he had tried to forget? They told him he had touched Heaven. Why then was he here? Had he done something awful that condemned him to an eternity of sin? Was his loss of memory the price he had paid for returning to a life he had left behind? Had he agreed to forever forget and never remember? Was he breaking such a vow by even trying? What if it was an accident, something never meant to be? What if it didn't matter how badly he wanted it and the memory loss was permanent? What would he do? What would _they_ make him do?

He slammed his chair away from the table and rose. Angry and restless, he stalked over to the window and glared down at the Stargate. Huge, intimidating, in a big room it dominated the space yet it was no more than a ring. It was more air than solid. Empty in the middle, yet casting a shadow that darkened the entire room.

It was the only thing in the entire complex to which he felt a connection. Somehow it reflected him and he reflected it. He didn't know why and the frustration within him flared up again. He raised his hand to the glass and pressed his fingers against it, his attention diverting from the Stargate to his reflection. Short blond hair, tousled by worried fingers, framed a strong face that currently showed signs of great strain confronted him. Blue eyes hidden behind a pair of glasses that he had been told belonged to him and which certainly did bring the world into focus. A world where his face was the face of a stranger and the barely seen image of him in the glass seem to reflect the ghost he believed he had become.

Gently he traced the outline of his face on the pane of glass in front of him. It seemed set in the centre of the hole in the middle of the Stargate, as though it was a circular frame for a picture. He stared at the gate for a moment then returned to contemplating his reflection.

Longer blond hair fell in an unruly mass to his ears, a continuous fringe shading his forehead and his eyes peered back owlishly through round frames, eyes that reflected his sudden surprise at the change.

__

A flash of something in the reflection, another man. Tall, in dress uniform. Dark hair plastered down, a fierce moustache that bristles whenever his lips move. Lack of respect is in his voice as he speaks: "So you think you've solved in fourteen days what they couldn't solve in two years?"

He freezes, startled and looks around. They hadn't told him this. What else are they hiding from him? "Two years?" and in front of him, a gentle old lady smiles encouragingly, offering him silent support in the face of obvious hostility.

He swallowed thickly and stared at the Stargate, taking in the ring, the symbols he could see even from here, the metal ramp, the huge red power couplings. 

__

"What is that?"

"It's your Stargate"

He hadn't asked what it was or how it worked. He had been too wrapped up in his own mind and fears but somehow, he knew, they didn't need to explain its function to him. Somehow, he knew he had explained it to _them_.

"Daniel?"

Turning sharply, he found himself face to face with a small woman who barely reached his shoulders. Dark hair tied back professionally exposed a pale, beautiful face dominated by a pair of rich dark eyes that were focused completely on him. Her uniform was hidden behind a white lab coat and she cradled a clipboard in her arms. Behind her stood the much larger commander of the base. In the absence of the four that had brought him back to Earth, he had spent more time with these two than with anyone else and they at least had tried to make him feel... human.

__

Am I human?

She took a step closer, frowning now as he stared at her without responding but it wasn't she who spoke. "Doctor Jackson?" the authoritative male voice caused him to refocus and he looked at the pair of them. They both looked worried. For him, he realised and wasn't sure if he should be comforted or concerned. He turned back to face the Stargate, realising he felt comforted but not wanting them to see it in his eyes.

"Are you alright, Doctor Jackson?" Hammond asked, a little more gently. 

He raised a hand to the glass again, tracing the outline of the Stargate. "No-one told me what a Stargate was" he mused softly.

Hammond and Fraiser exchanged a look. "Daniel..." the doctor began but stopped as he spoke again.

"The outer track is composed of star constellations" his voice sounded distant, almost drugged. "They have a unique order, a map. The gate uses seven symbols... six to define a destination in three-dimensional space and the seventh as a point of origin to chart a course" he blinked and his voice grew steadily stronger, more confident. "I searched through all known writing materials trying to translate the cover stone. Everything I could think of. Nothing matched. Then I realised they were constellations and found the seventh symbol..." he trailed off, then turned to face them.

For a moment, they both wore almost identical expressions of surprise. He swallowed, suddenly worried. Had he made a mistake? Been presumptuous? Maybe he had just dreamed something that wasn't true. "I... I'm sorry" he mumbled, backing off. "I..."

Hammond raised one hand, stalling him. "No, son, you're right"

He blinked in surprise. "I am?" His response was second-nature, so instinctive that for a moment, the blank confusion and aimless behaviour that had characterised his return was gone, and his blue eyes shone brightly with familiar excitement, an old surprised pleasure on his face. 

His smile was infectious and they smiled with him. "Can you remember anything else, son?" the General asked quickly. Fraiser frowned but it was too late, the question had already been asked.

Taking a deep breath, he glanced back at the Stargate, frowning. The excitement faded slowly to be replaced by a look of frustration and for a moment, Fraiser caught tears in his eyes as his hands balled into fists.

"Daniel" she stepped forwards and touched his arm. "It's alright. You don't need to rush this. You've remembered something. It's a start. A _good_ start. You've got something to work with now. The rest will come if you're patient" she smiled bravely at him, hoping he would pick up her confidence and not her concerns.

He stared down at her for a moment, unresponsive. Then he closed his eyes and took another deep breath, slowly uncurling his fists. After a moment he opened his eyes and looked back at her. "Will I? Remember that is. Do you know?"

Fraiser tried to meet his gaze then glanced at Hammond. Turning back, she returned his gaze steadily, trying to will all her confidence into her face for him to see. "Recovering from amnesia can be an uncertain road but your tests show you are healthy. We're here to help you, you won't be alone but it might take time. Just remember today, and that you showed you _can_ do it."

He stared at her blankly as if not understanding. Silently ordering her racing pulse to slow, she tried again. "You're a strong man, Daniel, you've always been determined and stubborn. Use that for yourself instead of for others. I'm not giving up on you, so don't you give up on yourself. Doctor's orders!"

__

"Napoleonic power-monger"

He took a step backwards, eyes narrowed sharply. Her hand fell away from his arm and a faint frown crossed her brow. Worry appeared in her eyes again. Worry and something else... hurt?

__

"Look, I'm sick of laying around. Help me up." The man's irritated voice rings out again around the infirmary as he struggles to push himself up. 

He had hurt her feelings when he moved away from her. Why? He stared at her, dimly aware of Hammond shifting restlessly, almost nervously, watching instead as her frown deepened, as resignation flickered in her eyes. 

__

The tall, imposing figure next to the bed makes no move to help him and instead attempts to reason with his sick friend. "Dr Fraiser believes you are not strong enough to undertake such a mission."

He swallowed thickly at the expression. Did she really believe he could recover or had she just said what he wanted to hear? 

__

"Yeah, whatever" the patient ignores his friend's wise council and climbs off the bed immediately collapsing into a heap on the floor.

And did he care what she thought? Did he care enough to want to remember?

__

Barely twitching a muscle, his friend tilts his head and one eyebrow rises. "Doctor Fraiser is usually correct in such matters." Effortlessly, he reaches down with a single hand and unceremoniously dumps the patient on the bed face down, who quietly acknowledges defeat.

Absently, he reached out to touch her still raised hand. "I trust you" he murmured quietly, not even aware he had spoken aloud until he heard his voice. Not certain why he said it but knowing, somehow, it was important, he felt a weight lift from his mind that he hadn't even known was there.

Her smile lit up her face and she glanced at Hammond who relaxed visibly. The General smiled at them both. "You're in good hands, Doctor Jackson" he informed him, and walked back into his office.

"Hold that thought, Daniel" she told him quietly. "If you need anything, my office door is always open"

He nodded his thanks and turned back to watch the Stargate. It still felt like the only true connection to this place he currently had but this time as he watched it, he felt as though it was a connection he could finally understand.


	3. Unwelcome Visitors

****

Chapter 3

"Have you ever seen a dais like this before?" Carter was asking Teal'c as Jacob and Quinn caught up.

"I have not, Major Carter" The Jaffa was circling the Stargate tensely, his jaw tight and eyes narrowed.

"Those holes look like they were made deliberately" Quinn mused thoughtfully, dropping to one knee for a closer look.

Carter nodded absently as she crouched down next to him and began delving into her backpack. The dais looked like it was made of naquadah and formed a perfect circle around the Stargate. Set a foot in from the edge, were a series of indentations, circling all the way around the dais, of various depths and sizes and each one looked as though it was lined with metals of different kinds. Some had decoration - a single geometric pattern at the base, or a group of four fish spiralling into the centre, others had no obvious decoration at all. The only thing these odd indentations had in common was a single raised bubble of metal in the very centre of their bases.

Quinn looked up at Teal'c and Jacob as Carter began scanning the dais. "You've never seen anything like this before?"

Teal'c raised an eyebrow, having already answered that. Jacob shook his head. "Anise called these marks "bowls" for want of a better word" he said "But none of them had any idea of what the purpose of this dais was for. It could be some kind of decoration or for holding food and drink offerings to any gods the people who once lived here believed in."

Quinn rose and walked around the dais until he was directly in front of the Stargate. "That's something else" he pointed to the indentations in front of him. There were two, and neither was bowl-shaped. Teal'c and Jacob joined him, studying their elongated, shallow forms silently.

"The top looks almost like an ankh" Quinn commented.

"It's a little distorted" Jacob replied dubiously.

"Wow!"

The three turned quickly as Carter rose and moved around the dais towards them. She stared at their questioning expressions for a moment, then looked back down at her palm as if to confirm something she couldn't believe. "There's naquadria in this dais"

"Really?" Quinn looked back at the dais with renewed interest and missed the frown that skipped across Jacob's features.

"You are certain of this?" Selmak asked immediately.

"Yeah. It's naquadria alright" she looked up into her father's face, finding only the symbiote's puzzlement. "I take it you haven't heard of naquadria being used in Stargate design before?"

"I have not" Selmak contemplated her for a moment, then lifted his head and scanned the area for a moment. "The Tok'ra here did not speak of naquadria being present either."

Her lips twisted slightly. "Well, it's definitely naquadria"

"Maybe the Tok'ra didn't get around to looking that closely at the Stargate" Quinn offered. "You said yourself that the Stargate had no DHD. Maybe they decided checking the materials it was made of wasn't as important as the buildings."

"Perhaps" Selmak was looking slightly unsettled. Carter frowned. She was used to seeing her father become jumpy but Selmak was usually a lot calmer.

"This indentation is unique" Teal'c completed another circuit of the dais and stopped beside them to glance at Quinn's distorted ankh. "There are no symbols or writings on this device. The symbols on the Stargate are unfamiliar to me"

"All of them?" Carter stepped up onto the dais to take a closer look. Her eyes widened as she studied the outer track.

"Maybe the local constellations?" Quinn was looking at the other side of the track.

"Anise's report indicated these did not represent local constellations" Selmak stepped up to join them, taking a closer look himself. "She concluded they were geometric abstractions but was unable to discover of what"

"Without a frame of reference, we might not be able to" Carter said, stepping back a single pace. "Geometric representations usually require some kind of cultural context for interpretation. We've found nothing in the temple ruins that could help us translate them"

Selmak nodded once. "That is indeed the problem the Tok'ra have encountered"

~Carter, come in~

She started as her radio crackled into life and grabbed it. "Go ahead, sir"

~We've got company, get everyone up here!~

"We're on our way, sir" she dropped her radio and nodded to Teal'c who was immediately turning to stare suspiciously back up the road they had come. 

Jacob scanned the mountainside until he spotted O'Neill gesture and duck behind some rocks. "There!" he said, leading the others up the steep slope to join him. When they arrived, O'Neill pointed grimly in the direction they had originally come from and handed his binoculars to the Tok'ra.

"I'm counting twenty Jaffa" Carter muttered, scanning the area herself. "Can you tell who they serve?"

"Not yet" Jacob replied tersely. "Where the hell did they come from?"

"There's an al'kesh just beyond those trees to the left. They haven't seen our ship yet but it's only a matter of time" O'Neill replied. "There's a hell of a lot more Jaffa than twenty but most of them are staying in the trees."

"They look like they're making themselves at home, sir" Carter added, changing her field of view to include the tree line. 

"Can we make it back to the ship?" Quinn asked.

"No" O'Neill said shortly. "They'll see us the minute we leave the temple"

"Then I'd say we have a problem" Jacob said dryly, handing the binoculars to Teal'c.

"Ya think?"

"We need to find somewhere defensible" Jacob turned to look across the mountainside, searching with his eyes for something appropriate. Aside from the slope they were currently hiding on, the plateau stood alone. A sheer drop on two sides plummeted hundreds, maybe thousands of feet downward into a valley that was crested by towering mountains on the other side. The short hill they had crested to find the temple led down a rocky slope to the tel'tak they had travelled in and in the distance beyond that was the tree line and the Jaffa.

Teal'c lowered the binoculars and returned them to O'Neill. "Jacob Carter, I believe there is a trail above us we can use. It will allow us to travel around the Jaffa and take refuge in the mountains. If we move with caution they will not be alerted to our presence"

"Is there anything in the ship that will identify who we are?" The Colonel asked.

"No. We took everything with us and the computer doesn't carry any more information than we needed to get here" Jacob responded. "They'll know someone's on the planet, but they won't know who. Hopefully, they'll think it's just more Jaffa"

"It'll give us time" O'Neill rose. "Teal'c, take point" he waited for Teal'c to begin climbing to the trail and the others to fall into step, then brought up the rear just behind Quinn, making sure their passage left as little to find as possible.


	4. Leap of Faith

****

Chapter 4

The blaring klaxons mercifully shut down with the Stargate as SG-2 walked down off the ramp thumping each other on the backs.

"I take it everything went according to plan?" Hammond asked from the bottom of the ramp, gazing past them to the lone figure standing in brown desert robes.

"Oh yeah" Feretti grinned. "General, this is Aja. Aja, General Hammond."

The figure pushed back her hood to reveal a dusky-skinned young woman with intense dark eyes and dark hair that was bound tightly at the base of her neck. She inclined her head gracefully at the introduction and though Hammond knew her to be Tok'ra, when she spoke it seemed to the General that it was the host speaking. "It is an honour to meet you, General Hammond"

"I'm glad you could make it, Aja" Hammond replied politely. "Do you wish to debrief immediately?"

"I think that would be wise"

Hammond glanced at Feretti who nodded. " Very well, come with me" he turned and left the room, followed by the Tok'ra and the rest of SG-2. Feretti started to follow but paused, feeling eyes on him. Looking up, he found himself meeting the intense stare of a lone figure standing at the window of the briefing room. He smiled tentatively but received no response. Sighing, he hurried after the others.

He arrived at the briefing room in time to see Doctor Jackson turn on his heel and disappear through a door at the far end of the room without acknowledging any of them. SG-2 took their seats slowly, glancing uncertainly at each other. Feretti understood their unease, felt it himself. No one knew what to do with the news that Daniel Jackson was alive a year after having accepted the finality of his death. Worse still, he didn't seem to recognise anyone and while Feretti knew it was completely illogical to resent being rebuffed by a man who didn't even remember his own name, he couldn't help feeling hurt. Only one other person on the base had known Jackson as long as Feretti had and the Major found himself feeling as though the archaeologist somehow owed it to him to remember who he was.

Shaking his head at his own thoughts he glanced at Hammond. "He's still...?" he began softly.

Hammond gave him a grim look and the Major took a seat with a sigh. 

Oblivious to the tension or the reason for it, the Tok'ra immediately turned to Hammond. "General, I will be remaining here for as long as the joint mission between the Tau'ri and Tok'ra continues on Shambhala"

"P5-2M7, sir" the Major elaborated at Hammond's questioning look.

The General nodded and returned his attention to the Tok'ra. "That's fine. We can have VIP quarters set up for you. I assume you will want access to the archaeology labs?"

"If that is where the artefacts are located, yes" she agreed. 

"Have you heard word yet from SG-1 or the Tok'ra scientists?"

Aja gazed at him then bowed her head. When she looked up again, her eyes flashed. "My name is Iris, General Hammond. No, the Tok'ra have not received word from Selmak or SG-1. Selmak's last broadcast was to inform us they had entered orbit without incident. We have heard nothing since. Unless they find a way to make the Stargate functional, it may yet be some time before we hear anything. "

The General stiffened. "We were told there was no Stargate on P5-2M7, hence the need for a tel'tak."

She sighed. "There is a Stargate. It was used to send the first team to Shambhala. However, they quickly discovered there was no way to establish an outgoing wormhole and were stranded on the planet. Although using a tel'tak took longer to reach the planet, at least it ensures SG-1 are capable of departing again."

"Anything else about this "routine" mission we should know?" Feretti asked sarcastically. He subsided at Hammond's look but only out of respect for the General.

Iris transferred her gaze to the Major. "We did not mention the Stargate because we believed it to be useless. I am aware of nothing else that is being kept from you."

Hammond studied her silently for several moments. Unlike the others, he didn't have the luxury of expressing his disapproval of Tok'ra methodology and attitudes as often as they did, although for the most part, he did share their concerns. He nodded. "We'll stay alert in case any messages come through regarding the mission but if the Tok'ra are right, it should be a routine mission. Captain, take our guest to Sergeant Hilary. She'll show her where her quarters are. The rest of you are dismissed but stay on base" he rose expectantly, and SG-2 rose with him. Feretti watched his second-in-command smile at the Tok'ra and politely offer her the chance to exit the room before him, then follow her out. As they were left alone in the room, Hammond turned a questioning gaze on him.

"Something wrong, Major?"

"Yes sir" Feretti took a deep breath and squared his shoulders. "When have we ever known a mission from the Tok'ra to go as planned..."

"Major..."

"Sir, I can't remember one, and while the Tok'ra claim this is an abandoned planet, the fact is their own science team _has_ gone missing...

"Major."

"Without a Stargate, SG-1 could be stranded if anything goes wrong and it could take us months to find out anything happened, let alone the time it would take to mount a rescue...."

"Major!"

This time Feretti subsided under the command.

"Thank you. The Tok'ra can't afford to lose their own people anymore than we're willing to lose ours. They've shared all the information they have on this planet and it's in the labs being analysed by our own scientists. They've also promised to share any communications they receive from Selmak with us so we can stay updated with SG-1's status. Good enough, Major?"

Chastised, Feretti bowed his head. "Yes sir"

"Is there anything else?"

"No, sir"

"Good. I want SG-2 to stay on base until further notice. If anything does happen, I want your team ready to depart immediately."

Feretti glanced up quickly, but the General's expression was impossible to read. "Dismissed" he finished blandly.

After having ensured his team were fully aware of their "on-call" status, Feretti was the last one to make it out of the showers as he mused over the situation with the Tok'ra. He didn't know nearly enough about what was going on at Shambhala, he decided, but the fact that even the General seemed wary of the mission was enough to worry him. Changing his mind about going to the commissary, he headed to the archaeology labs instead.

Waiting for the elevators he almost gave up when the doors finally opened. "What's the hold up?" he demanded irritably on stepping inside, glaring at the pair of regulation boots sharing the space with him.

On receiving no response, he hit the button and turned, meeting a startled blue gaze. "Ah crap" he said, without thinking about it. "Sorry" he added sheepishly.

He watched as Jackson looked away in obvious discomfort and mentally kicked himself. The elevator jolted into motion and the silence grew heavier as it rose through the levels.

__

Christ, Louis, it's only Daniel. Say something! he heard his own mind admonish him but the back of his throat felt dry. Although the man sharing the elevator looked like Jackson and sounded like Jackson, Feretti only had to look in his eyes to know it wasn't Jackson. Jackson's eyes had always been alive with emotion, questioning the world around him, ever curious, always fascinated. Even after Sha're had died, the man's zest for life hadn't died with her. His emotions had become noticeably a little sadder, a little more hardened, but they had still existed for all to see. Now those same eyes seemed lost, confused, adrift on currents that no one else could see or understand. They were eyes that didn't seek answers because they didn't know there were questions to ask. They were eyes that were... that were... _admit it, Louis, say the damn word_... dead.

__

Numb. His mind shied away from the d-word. He didn't want to associate it with that man beside him anymore, that man who had experienced enough pain and death to last a life-time. _Preferably the previous one_, he thought sourly. And not for the first time since finding out he was still alive did Feretti wonder about Ascension. What it had been like, why Jackson had returned. What did it mean? Heck, that was the question the entire base wanted the answer to but the only man who had the answers was the only man none of them could ask.

The jolt of the elevator dragged him out of his musings and he looked up sharply. Not his level, he realised. Jackson glanced up hesitantly and didn't make a move to get off either.

"Not your stop?" Feretti found himself asking and was rewarded with a quick shake of the head and a nervous smile.

"Yeah, not mine either" He pressed the buttons again impatiently but it didn't make the door close any faster.

He sighed and gestured impatiently, turning away to find Jackson staring at his hands. "Uh... something wrong?" he asked, a little taken aback by the intensity of that stare.

Catching himself, Jackson shook his head again and transferred his gaze to the doors, watching them close. Not sure what to make of that, Feretti lapsed into silence again.

"You were angry with me"

"What?" Feretti was so startled by the sudden statement that he jumped. Jackson was staring at him again with the same intense gaze.

"In the desert"

"Desert? What desert?" The Major was thoroughly bewildered now.

"You threw my books away"

That stare was becoming unnerving. Feretti felt himself push back against the wall of the elevator he was leaning against to avoid it even though Jackson hadn't moved from his side of the small space.

"Books?"

Jackson nodded slowly, unblinking. "You were angry with me"

Feretti stared at him. "Daniel, I...." he stopped. Books? Desert? Angry with him? _Oh god, does he actually mean....?_ He leaned forward and this time met Jackson's steady gaze with an unwavering stare of his own. "Yes. I was."

Jackson nodded, a tiny hint of satisfaction flaring in his eyes before it vanished and he looked away again. It was such a brief glimpse, but Feretti was surprised to find himself treasuring even that tiny spark of life. "You were angry with me when the doors opened just now"

__

I was? Oh. Yeah. Feretti surprised them both with a chuckle. "No, just the damn elevator. Me and technology.... well, you know" he trailed off. The Daniel Jackson who remembered his past would know, but this man... he turned back to Jackson quickly. "Daniel. We got off on the wrong foot but that was eight years ago. By the end of the mission you'd proved us all wrong and I was proud to call you a friend. And when you... left... er..." he looked away. Talking to a living, breathing person about his own death was just plain creepy.

"Died?"

"Yeah" Feretti flushed slightly. Jackson looked uncomfortable as well and Feretti wondered what he thought of the situation. The elevator stopped and the door opened. This time it was Feretti's stop. He stared at the corridor and looked at Jackson. "Yeah, anyway. When you... um.. died... you had a lot more friends than anyone realised"

Jackson swallowed slightly. "Thanks" 

Feretti stared at him for a moment, not sure what to make of the tone in the other man's voice. _Oh crap, he's frightened._ Feretti realised in a sudden moment of clarity as he watched Jackson glance absently at the level indicator above the doors then turn to regard the floor. "My stop" the Major started to leave the elevator then paused. "Hey, I'm headed to the labs, you can come along if you like"

Jackson shifted uncomfortably. "I... um..."

Feretti smiled wryly. "I'm just going to be reading some papers, Daniel. Keep me company, save me from boredom" he grinned suddenly. "Unless you've got something better to do"

Jackson hesitated a moment, then smiled shyly and stepped out of the elevator. "No" he agreed softly. "I've got nothing better to do"


	5. Hidden Paths

****

Chapter 5

"Do you think they saw us?" Carter ducked down the escarpment, followed closely by O'Neill. It had taken hours of focus and concentration to navigate the sheer mountain trail without being seen by any eagle-eyed Jaffa. After having experienced the sensation of being so exposed for so long, the group, now hidden in the high-altitude forest and enclosed on all sides by trees, felt strangely imprisoned.

"Doesn't seem like it" Jacob whispered from his vantagepoint behind some boulders.

"They have, however, discovered the tel'tak" Teal'c dropped down to land almost noiselessly beside them.

"Alright, we need to keep moving" O'Neill slung his gun over his shoulders again. "Where's Jonas?"

"Colonel!" The Kelownan's voice was almost a stage whisper through the trees ahead.

O'Neill set his jaw and quickly moved in that direction. The trees parted to reveal Quinn crouched on the ground studying some boulders. He looked up as they approached. "There's a symbol here on the boulders," he said softly, gesturing. "I think it's a hieroglyph"

O'Neill's eyes narrowed at that and he glanced over Quinn's shoulder. The symbol certainly looked pictographic, although he wasn't sure what it was supposed to represent. It seemed to be some kind of spotted flag. "What does it mean?" he asked.

Quinn had already pulled out a notebook and was flicking through it, frowning. "It is familiar" Teal'c admitted slowly. "But I am uncertain as to what it means. It is not a symbol I have seen the Goa'uld use often"

"Selmak thinks it's familiar too" Jacob muttered. "But it's not a symbol he's seen for a long time"

O'Neill was silent for a moment. "Alright, let's move," he said moving around the boulders to follow the barely visible trail behind it. He stopped a few feet down the trail. He didn't need to look behind him to know one person had fallen behind. "Jonas, ya coming?"

"Yeah" Quinn finished scribbling a sketch of the symbol in his notebook, grabbed his backpack and hurried after them. O'Neill shook his head and muttered something under his breath. Even Teal'c, who was standing next to him, didn't hear what the Colonel said but he did hear Daniel Jackson's name mentioned amongst the unintelligible muttering.

"Nice of you to join us" O'Neill said dryly and continued onwards.

The trail seemed to lead downwards, snaking before them like some dark serpent. Gradually, they lost sight of the sky completely and found themselves completely encased in darkness. Even though they knew it was still daylight, it was as if this land was forsaken, forever shrouded in night and before long, they found themselves having to use flashlights to prevent injuries on the steep, treacherous trail.

For how long they travelled, they weren't entirely certain, but eventually the terrain began to level out slowly, and the canopy thinned out, allowing light to once again find its way to them. When they eventually stopped, it was in a clearing that was enclosed on all sides by forested cliffs. O'Neill turned slowly, eyeing his surroundings warily.

"This would make one hell of a trap" Jacob commented, looking upwards.

"Teal'c, take a look at this" Quinn said softly, moving off to the rocks. The Jaffa joined him immediately, peering at the symbols the Kelownan had noticed. Quinn shook his head as his hands lightly trailed the hieroglyphs. Almost everything was serpentine. A snake reared up, looking deadly and hostile, surrounded on either side by two faceless but intimidating figures. With them was a shallow boat being towed by four figures. Another serpent encircled the cabin of the boat. All around the central figures were rising cobras that appeared to be spitting fire.

"Goa'uld" Teal'c said softly.

"Where?" O'Neill asked immediately, turning to look at them.

"We have entered the domain of a Goa'uld, O'Neill. Only those who are chosen by the Gods to be here can pass"

"Nice" the Colonel muttered.

"Which Goa'uld?" Jacob asked.

Quinn shook his head. "The hieroglyphs indicate this is a sacred path that only the worthy can enter but I can't find any sign of which Goa'uld lived here"

"There is no such name present" Teal'c agreed.

Carter frowned "If this is a sacred path, why does it end here? There's nowhere to go except back the way we came"

They all looked at each other.

"Oh for crying out loud" O'Neill muttered and stalked over to them. He stared at the symbols. "Someone seems to like snakes. Apophis?"

"They are guardians, O'Neill" Teal'c corrected. "Many Goa'uld use the symbol of the snake to protect their domains and doorways"

"So this is a doorway?" O'Neill looked doubtfully at the solid rock. "You sure?"

"It probably needs a password or key of some kind" Jacob joined them, studying the rock closely.

"Open Sesame?" O'Neill suggested hopefully.

Jacob ignored that.

"Because I don't know how to say "friend" in Elvish"

"Jack" Jacob said painfully.

"What?" Jack looked innocent. 

Jacob gave his daughter an even stare. She cleared her throat and carefully arranged her mouth to hide her amusement. The Colonel was baiting Jacob deliberately, she knew that. Her father probably knew it too. They had a similar sarcastic sense of humour and had become very good at using it as a weapon against each other. Part of her was quietly pleased that both men had met their match in the other.

Teal'c turned to O'Neill. "I am not familiar with the Elvish language"

"Really?" O'Neill looked surprised. "You've never met an elf? Or a dwarf? How about a little guy with hairy feet who eats all your dinner?"

"I have not" Teal'c replied evenly, his patient tone indicating he was aware that O'Neill was making him the butt of some obscure Tau'ri joke.

"Not even a big scary eye that glares at you from the top of a huge tower?"

"The Eye of Ra?" Quinn looked at O'Neill quickly. "Where?"

O'Neill blinked at Quinn incredulously. "What?"

Jacob bit back a chuckle as the Colonel's joke fell flat and turned his attention to the rock face as O'Neill glanced at him. At that moment, there was an odd grinding sound, and one of the spitting cobra's glowed. The rock shivered and then split apart, earth tumbling as an ancient doorway opened slowly to reveal darkness in front of them.

The five scattered, taking up defensive positions as the door shuddered to a halt and a wary figure stepped outside holding a zat gun confidently in front of her.

"Anise" Jacob stepped forward almost immediately.

"Selmak" she nodded, her eyes scanning the clearing as SG-1 slowly brought themselves into view. "Colonel O'Neill"

"Are you okay?" Jacob asked. "What's been going on here?"

"We will speak in the Hall of Apophis" she said. "Come" Before they could say anything, she turned away and disappeared into the darkness.

"Apophis?" O'Neill demanded but even Jacob looked taken aback by that comment. With a muttered sigh, the Colonel turned to his team. "Keep your eyes open" he ordered and gestured for Jacob to lead the way.

"Thanks" Jacob said sourly, walking into the darkness.

"Hey, they're your people" O'Neill retorted, following.

"Believe it or not, Jack, the Tok'ra _are_ on the same side as Earth" Jacob muttered to O'Neill as the door crashed shut behind them, plunging them into darkness. SG-1 broke out their flashlights and watched as Anise activated the Tok'ra version of one, continuing on down the corridor without looking back to see what they were doing.

"Could have fooled me" O'Neill muttered glaring at the back of her.

"Jack.."

"I know, I know, you aren't all like her. But come on, Jacob. Even you've gotta admit she's got something of a vaudeville act going on"

Jacob threw him an exasperated look then suddenly his gaze defocused.

"Dad?" Carter asked immediately, sounding concerned.

He held up a hand, then chuckled. "Selmak wanted to know what a "vaudeville act" was."

There was silence for a moment.

"And?" O'Neill broke the silence first, looking curious.

Jacob chuckled. "Takes one to know one" he picked up his pace and disappeared into the gloom looking for Anise.

The Colonel winced and there was a sudden silence behind him. "Jonas?" he asked without turning round.

"Colonel?"

"Are you grinning?"

Behind him, he heard Quinn hastily clear his throat. "Not this time"

"Carter?"

There was a pause. "Sir?"

"It's not funny"

"No sir"

O'Neill sighed, shook his head and stalked off up the tunnel after Jacob knowing someone was amused but not sure which one was the traitor. Quinn and Carter glanced at each other wryly, then looked at Teal'c. With a tiny smile, the Jaffa tilted one smug eyebrow at them and continued on his way.


	6. First Steps

****

Chapter 6

Feretti groaned and pushed the last report aside, leaning back and rubbing his eyes. Reading wasn't one of his favourite pastimes, especially when the author was a scientist from another world. Lowering his hands, he glanced around the lab suddenly aware of how big it was when there was no one else in there with him.

It hadn't started that way, when Feretti had turned up to the lab there had been several archaeologists and linguists working on various projects, including the P5-2M7 artefacts and reports that had been sent by the Tok'ra. As if a spotlight had suddenly signalled him out, all work and conversation in the lab had ceased and he had found himself the centre of attention.

Not himself, he had realised almost immediately. They were staring at his companion, watching his every move, sizing him up, as if expecting something. As discretely as he could manage, he had glanced at Jackson out of the corner of his eye and found his companion already moving off towards the back of the labs, disappearing amongst the shelves of books. His back had been straight, his shoulders relaxed, his stride purposeful; he looked for all the world as though he had come there deliberately, so focused on a specific goal the others in the room did not exist for him. Under the intense scrutiny of men and women who had been his peers, Dr. Daniel Jackson had looked every inch the man he had been before his death.

It wasn't until Feretti had followed him to the back of the labs, and the quiet isolated desk space at the end of an aisle surrounded by books that he had realised the truth. Jackson had slumped into one of the seats running trembling hands through his hair. Not sure what to do, Feretti had reached out hesitantly and laid a hand on Jackson's shoulder and watched as the bewildered man he considered a friend jumped like a frightened deer and flinched away as if he had been burned.

Cursing himself for being an idiot for bringing him to the archaeology labs, Feretti then sank into a seat next to him and swivelled around to face him. "This the first time you've come here?" he had asked in what he hoped was an encouraging tone.

Jackson had sucked in a shaky breath and nodded silently, hands clasped to the back of his neck, elbows still resting on the table.

"I'm sorry. I didn't think."

Jackson had raised his head then and looked Feretti in the eye. His eyes looked glassy, intimidated almost to the point of tears and Feretti had again felt a sick churning in his stomach that hinted of guilt. "Everyone..." he paused and sighed again. "It doesn't matter. I'm used to it" he looked away again and began readjusting his glasses.

Feretti had frowned at that. "Used to it? You mean that happens every time you walk into a room?"

"I used to walk the halls when they... SG-1... brought me here. Everyone kept staring. I thought..." he shrugged absently. "It doesn't matter" he finished abruptly and firmly pushed his glasses back onto his nose.

Feretti had remembered the anger that had been on O'Neill's face when SG-1 had first returned with Daniel Jackson in tow, his argument to Hammond about bringing Daniel home to be among friends instead of the aliens Daniel had erroneously felt he belonged to. That anger had seemed strangely out of place to Feretti at the time but now he thought he understood it. Although a gentle, almost shy, man, Daniel Jackson had a powerful personality he was more than capable of forcing onto others when he needed to address issues that mattered to him. Often it had made Jackson annoying, even intimidating and abrasive, but it had been so much a part of who he was no one had ever considered what a Daniel Jackson without those qualities would be like. And looking at him now, Feretti had realised they were indeed qualities and not flaws. They were Jackson's weapons in a military world that demanded strength and aggressiveness at every turn, weapons fought not with metal, chemicals and force of numbers but with ideas, words and force of personality. Without any of these, he wasn't Daniel Jackson. He was broken, vulnerable. Devastated. Feeling the anger boiling in his blood, Feretti had suddenly wanted to know what had happened to his friend; wanted to face down the monster who could strip a man of everything he ever was and leave him for the vultures to pick over. 

"Don't worry, kid" was all he had said, patting Jackson's arm gently. "I've got your six"

Feretti rubbed his eyes again, feeling the anger flaring again. He sighed and rose, stretching his legs. They had stayed hidden away in the back of the labs. Feretti had brought the boxes he had needed over to Jackson and gone through it. Jackson had occasionally picked up a folder and flicked through it without really reading it before rising restlessly to wander down the aisle, looking at the titles on the shelves. After a quiet debate on whether it was a good idea, Feretti had decided he wasn't a doctor, he couldn't second-guess this situation, and left Jackson to do whatever felt most comfortable to do. The younger man had quickly disappeared into other areas of the lab. That had been hours ago.

Now the lab was silent, Feretti walked out of his corner and looked around. Jackson was sprawled in a seat under the main light, engrossed in a large book. 

"Hey" Feretti pulled up another chair. "What is it?"

Jackson looked up, a little bleary eyed and blinked owlishly at him. The Major grinned at the familiar expression as Jackson lifted the book to reveal the subject matter. "I wasn't sure if I should touch anything," he admitted. "And I wouldn't know where to start anyway" he looked around. "There's a lot of stuff here". 

Stuff. Feretti's smile faded as the reality of the archaeologist's condition settled in again. It wasn't a word he had ever expected to hear from Jackson when talking about archaeology. 

"Then I noticed this book" Jackson was continuing. He tapped it. "I don't know. It looked interesting so I decided to read it"

"Mesoamerican culture" Feretti noted with a nod. It was odd, he reflected, but somehow he had expected Jackson to be drawn to the Egyptology books. Linguistics and Egyptology had been the reason Jackson joined the Stargate programme in the first place. "Anything worth reading?" he tried.

"Yeah" Jackson turned the book slightly so Feretti could see the pages as well. "There's reference to a great epic associated with... Topiltzin and his father, Mixcoatl, although Mixcoatl seems to be found in Mixtec as well as Aztec sources, and his name means "cloud serpent", or maybe it's a title, there seems to be some debate about that, actually, since he was some kind of Chichimec lord, or a ruler of Culhuacan, and is found as a statue in Cholula, at least according to legend. Anyway, he marries the princess, Chimalman and their son, Topiltzin springs from her chest fully armed, ready to fight his father's wars, and together they create a great Toltec empire, until the four hundred brothers of Mixcoatl kill him, which leads to Topiltzin taking revenge and expands the Toltec empire to include Pueblo, Cholula, Coatzalcoalcos, Acallan, conquering the Maya and receiving the name Kulkulcan, which means "feathered serpent", and dies in Acallan, leaving an heir, Huemac, who is tricked by the evil sorcerer, Tezcatlipoca, sending the empire into decay. Huemac and Tezcatlipoca begin a battle that destroys Tollan and Huemac eventually makes it to Acallan where he throws himself into a bonfire, rising up to the heavens to become Venus, the Morning Star, and becoming known as Quetzalcoatl, the feathered serpent. Although, the archaeology and the myth don't really match all that well, and..." he paused, finally becoming aware of Feretti grinning broadly at him. "What?"

"Nothing" Feretti managed to hold back a laugh, but the grin refused to go away. "So. You like Mayan stories, huh?"

Jackson studied him suspiciously for a moment longer then shrugged and glanced down at the book he had been reading. "Yeah, I guess so, but it's not really Mayan..."

This time Feretti did laugh. Jackson pulled back, looking a little startled and confused, and the Major choked back his humour with a chuckle. "Sorry. I'm not laughing at you" he tried to reassure him.

Jackson raised both eyebrows at him, but eventually a faint smile tugged at his lips. "Look, uh.... what were you reading before?" he asked after a moment.

"The P5-2M7 reports? You want to come round back and help? Because, between you and me, I keep getting lost" Feretti paused as Jackson frowned, suddenly concerned he was pushing this too fast. He hadn't shown any sign of his memory returning, just occasional flashes of familiarity. Maybe what he was doing was wrong, maybe Doctor Fraiser would kill him slowly and painfully later but right now, Feretti didn't care. He had seen a spark of the old Daniel Jackson and he damn well didn't want to let it go again.

Jackson's expression cleared. "I don't know if I'll be any help," he said a little dubiously.

"Well, you can always fetch me coffee if I start falling asleep" Feretti grinned, rising and returning to the files. 

"Right" Jackson replied dryly, but with a hint of humour in his eyes.

The truth was, Jackson didn't want to leave. Since meeting Feretti in the elevator, he was finally beginning to form a connection to something on this base that wasn't that overwhelming Stargate or the doctor. He had finally found someone who didn't make him feel like a circus act every time he entered a room and more importantly, someone who seemed to be able to get passed the hole in his memory. While there were times when that uncomfortable subject came to the foreground without ever really being said, Jackson felt an odd surge of confidence just by being around this man, and although he didn't want to admit it, he was frightened that if he left this man's presence, he would crawl back into that shell of overwhelming fear and isolation he had been a prisoner of ever since arriving at the SGC. So, if reading a bunch of files he knew nothing about with this man meant he could avoid another hour of self-doubt and circular arguments, he was more than willing to do it.


	7. Kingdom of the Gods

****

Chapter 7

The tunnels continued downward through a series of stone doors decorated in hieroglyphics and cavernous rooms before Anise finally reached her destination. Including the first door in the clearing, SG-1 counted six doors and five caverns before finally stopping in what appeared to be the sixth. In the subterranean darkness, they saw very little detail of their surroundings but there was more than enough for them to see the Egyptian feel to the decorations although it wasn't clear which Goa'uld had called this place home.

"Holy Hannah"

Upon coming to a stop in the cavern, the first well lit room of the entire underground complex they had come to, Jacob and O'Neill could do nothing but stare. The others entered slowly, also stunned and paused, looking around them in amazement.

By far the largest cavern they had come across yet, the room was clearly a ceremonial hall of some kind. The entrance was guarded by two great dogs, frozen in a pose of watchfulness. On the walls over them hung images of a five-pointed star and around their heads sat coiled cobras as though some kind of crown. Golden steps spread out from the centre of the hall, sweeping up to a dais upon which sat a great golden throne, carved with countless and nameless faces. On the wall, just behind the throne a large red disk enclosed by slim horns seemed to rise out of a rain of feathers. Far above this, near the top of the wall, two wings flared out from something that might have been a basket, their spreading, curling form looking extremely familiar to the spellbound new arrivals.

In front of the throne rose a single, slim pillar that ended in a dog's head and with two arms outstretched and at the base of the throne itself lay what appeared to be a footrest in the shape of a pig. In each of the pillar's outstretched arms, something rested, two necklaces it seemed, one in the shape of a barred pillar, the second in the shape of an ankh. Around the base of the dais stretched a design that could have been either a long, thick rope, or another serpent motif. It was hard to tell.

The side walls of the hall were no less decorated either, as numerous images of serpents in various poses appeared. Many seemed to be battling a humanoid figure but there were also cobras that seemed to be looking down on the battle from on high, cobras that spat fire, as the images on the outer doorway had depicted. 

"It's amazing" Carter breathed, turning slowly. There was a breeze whipping through room, and it took her several moments to locate the window high up the northern wall, the light seeming to strike the centre of the red disk, making it glow like the sun. 

"Imagine the cost of redecorating this place" O'Neill recovered and turned quickly to face the three Tok'ra who were watching them from the bottom of some steps that seemed to lead towards the single window far above them.

Anise stepped forward. "This is Sin and Ilithya," she said, gesturing to the male and female Tok'ra with her respectively.

O'Neill contemplated them for a moment, then looked at Anise. "This is Jonas Quinn" he introduced the Kelownan, then glanced at Quinn. "Anise. Her host is called Freya. You've read about her?" 

"The armbands and the zatar'c incidents" Quinn nodded and noticed rest of SG-1 flinch. 

Anise pursed her lips tightly at the references but nodded politely to him. "Doctor Jackson is not here?"

"He's busy" O'Neill said curtly, then abruptly changed the subject. Anise was the last person he wanted to discuss Jackson with. "So. You got lost?"

Anise tilted her head at him with a slightly disapproving twitch to her lips. "When we realised we could not use the Stargate to return, we expanded our search of Shambhala to make use of our time until the Tok'ra sent a ship for us. We came across this underground complex by accident and were exploring it when the earth began to shake. We thought it was an earthquake initially, until we returned to the surface and discovered it was a ha'tak taking off from one of the mountains to the north. The ha'tak seemed to have triggered a volcanic reaction so we took refuge from the worst of it. When it subsided, we returned here to continue studying."

"And you didn't think of making it obvious how to find you?" O'Neill asked sarcastically.

"If we had done that, the Jaffa would have found us" Ilithya responded evenly.

"Do you know which Goa'uld controls the Jaffa?" Carter asked.

"No. We were trying to avoid being detected by them" Ilithya's expression was bland.

Carter stared at her for a moment, started to speak and then paused, glancing at O'Neill. The Colonel rolled his eyes.

"Well, the good news is we have a ship" Quinn offered wryly. "Although the bad news is that the Jaffa have found it"

"Then you are as trapped as we" Sin observed gravely, and turned away to contemplate the walls apparently considering the conversation to be over.

O'Neill's eyes narrowed at his back, but Carter jumped in first. "What about the Stargate? Are you sure it can't be used?"

Anise nodded. "We did make an attempt to study it when we realised there were Jaffa arriving here but there is no means of activating it. We attempted a manual dial. It failed."

"It does not matter if the Stargate was functional" Ilithya interrupted. "We have not found a way to translate the symbols on the gate. Even with a DHD we would not know what co-ordinates to enter"

Carter frowned. "Sir, with your permission I'd like to have a look at the Stargate and see if we can find a way to activate it."

O'Neill nodded. "You and Jonas work on the Stargate. Teal'c, you and I are going to try and get a closer look at those Jaffa and our ship" he looked at Jacob expectantly. 

The Tok'ra nodded. "I want to see why those Jaffa are here too" he glanced at Anise. "What have you discovered about this planet so far?"

The three Tok'ra looked at each other for a moment, then Sin nodded and turned to face Jacob. "The Stargate seems to be the oldest artefact on the planet, although the temple complex appears to be around two thousand years old. There's a strong similarity between the temple complex and Kheb, although we have found no art or writings from this complex. We speculate they concentrated on oral tradition instead. We have found evidence of communal living - furniture, utensils - particularly bowls. As well as that, we have found many examples of musical instruments, particularly wind instruments and percussion. Music seems to have been very important here."

"That doesn't sound like Kheb" Carter commented.

"Indeed. Kheb was a place of solitude and meditation. Words were spoken with the intent to teach, otherwise one made no sound" Teal'c agreed.

"What is Shambhala?" Quinn asked curiously.

"It is an ancient kingdom, a great centre of spiritual learning" Anise turned to him, apparently glad to no longer be concentrating on O'Neill. "It could be located by a chain of eight mountains surrounding a plateau. When looked at in the correct manner, the kingdom appears as an eight-petal lotus flower. In the centre of the kingdom lies the capital city, Kalapa and there is also a noted sun temple and moon temple."

"Seen from above, the land surrounding the Stargate does indeed appear to form an eight-petal lotus," Ilithya said softly.

"Where does... this fit in?" The Kelownan gestured to the hall they were standing in.

"Shambhala is linked to a subterranean civilisation known as Agartha" Sin said dryly. "We thought, at first, this was Agartha and the Goa'uld had claimed it for themselves"

"We discovered that was not this case. This complex is entire Goa'uld in origin" Ilithya concluded.

"And older than the temple complex near the Stargate" Sin added.

"We don't agree on that," Ilithya said quickly and Anise nodded in agreement with Ilithya.

"And this Goa'uld is... Apophis?" Quinn encouraged.

"We don't agree on that either" Sin shot Anise a look.

"I believe Apophis did not necessarily build this place," Anise said. "But he did claim it at some stage in its history. This complex is devoted to the serpent motif and only Apophis carried that symbol."

O'Neill pointed at the large disk on the wall behind the throne. "I've seen that before. On Ra."

Anise nodded. "That is indeed the sun disk"

"And those outstretched wings are the mark of Heru'Ur" Carter added, gesturing to the symbols that were pictured above the sun disk.

Anise nodded in agreement again. "But they are the only symbols representing Ra and Heru'Ur that we have found. Heru'Ur was Ra's son. It is possible this place was first the abode of Ra but at some later date became controlled by Apophis"

"Apophis and Ra were indeed great enemies" Teal'c said slowly. "But I do not recall any such location belonging to Apophis while I was First Prime. I also do not remember Bra'tac speaking of such a place when he was First Prime."

"This place has been abandoned for a long time. It might have been from a time long before you or Bra'tac were even born" Anise offered. "Being Jaffa gives you long life but you do not live as long as a Goa'uld."

"Do you know why the Goa'uld abandoned this place?" Selmak asked suddenly.

The three Tok'ra scientists glanced at each other then shook their heads. "Ra and Apophis are both dead but these halls have been abandoned for much longer than that." Ilithya mused. "We have seen nothing to explain why the Goa'uld left this place or why Jaffa have returned."

Selmak turned to O'Neill. "We should find out who those Jaffa serve. It might help answer our questions."

O'Neill nodded. "How many ways are there into this complex?"

"One that we have been able to find" Anise replied.

"Then we can defend this place if we have to" O'Neill nodded. He turned. "Jacob, Teal'c, you're with me. Carter, try and work out how to activate the gate from here until I get back and start rigging this place in case we bring back any uninvited guests"

"Yes sir" Carter said quietly.

"And you..." he glanced at the Tok'ra. "Stay out of trouble" and with that, he was gone.


	8. Dreams Teach

****

Chapter 8

Initially tentative about joining Feretti in something he felt he didn't really have any right to be involved in, Jackson soon became absorbed in the material he was reading. The reports were detailing the exploration of a planet someone had decided to call "Shambhala" and covered extensive archaeological research that had been done at the site. At first, he found himself just reading through the hypotheses, research and conclusions to pass the time, but soon he found himself dissatisfied by his inability to understand key words or phrases or scientific methods.

__

This isn't going to work, he realised eventually, putting the folder down and rising. While reading that book on Mesoamerican history he had begun to suspect something about himself. Perusing these files had confirmed it. He hated not knowing something. If he encountered something he didn't know or understand, he had to investigate it, he had to explore it, and he absolutely _required_ himself to attain as complete knowledge of it as he could before moving on. There was no way he was going to be able to make it through these papers without understanding the subject matter and that meant going back to basics.

"What's not going to work?" Feretti looked up curiously but Jackson had already moved away from the table. The Major put his folder down and watched, for a moment wondering if Jackson was leaving. He quickly realised that wasn't the case. Jackson looked thoroughly absorbed in his own thoughts, as if a man on a mission. He was clearly hunting the shelves for something specific and Feretti decided to stay put until he could see what had troubled the archaeologist. 

A few minutes later, Jackson returned carrying three books. He placed them down on the table, picked up one and immediately turned to the index. Feretti stared at the titles in confusion. All three books were basic introductions to scientific areas. There was one about the methods of archaeological architecture, another on palaeontology and the one that Jackson was currently flicking through with such a determined look on his face, was something to do with geophysics. Feretti blinked at that revelation. _There's physics in archaeology?_ he wondered in disbelief.

After that, Feretti noticed a pattern developing. For the most part, Jackson buried himself completely in reading. Usually the folders, often pausing to flick through the books. Occasionally, however, he would rise and wander off down the shelves looking for specific and more advanced books, checking something, before returning and picking up where he had left off. It meant it was taking Jackson a lot longer to read through the information than Feretti, who was mainly just scanning it for an overview of what potential dangers SG-1 might inadvertently get themselves into.

It was a lot more intensive than Feretti had initially envisaged for Jackson but the archaeologist looked more relaxed and at ease with himself than at any time since he had returned through the gate. The Major bit back a sigh and wondered for the thousandth time if he had done the right thing, and decided to leave Jackson alone. 

Jackson was trying to find a book on the shelves again when he felt a tap on his shoulder. 

"Hm?"

"I'm calling it a night" Feretti told him. "You probably should too"

"I was just going to..." Jackson began, gesturing vaguely to the shelf.

Feretti tried not to smile. "I need to pack this stuff back away. It doesn't belong to us, the Tok'ra loaned it and they get real loud when we don't look after their toys"

Jackson considered that for a moment. "I can work on it tomorrow then?"

__

Work on it? "Uh.. sure, why not" Feretti studied him. "Knock yourself out"

Jackson smiled wistfully as he watched Feretti box everything up. "I heard a bump on the head can cure memory loss"

Feretti shot him a quick look but there was no despair in the blue eyes that gazed back at him. Infact, Feretti wasn't sure what the emotion he could see was all about. Jackson's smile was faint and peculiar, his expression almost thoughtful.

"Hey, Jackson. You go beating yourself up and you can go find the Doc by yourself. There's no way in hell _I'm_ gonna tell her you're trying to self-medicate"

Jackson blinked, then laughed. It was the first, genuinely good-humoured laugh the Major had heard from him since his return and it gave him an irrational surge of hope. "Yeah, that wouldn't go down too well, would it?" he chuckled.

"You said it" Feretti packed the box away and led the way out of the lab, switching the light off as he went. "You want to do lunch in the commissary?" he asked casually.

Jackson looked startled. "Uh.. you don't have to do that"

"We all gotta eat" Feretti looked amused.

"I suppose..." Jackson studied Feretti, looking for some sign of pity, or the martyred expression of someone who was only being polite but found neither. The offer seemed genuine. "Sure. Thirteen hundred?"

"Works for me. See you then, Daniel"

"Yeah" Jackson looked thoughtful again as Feretti disappeared into the elevator.

He didn't know sitting around reading could be so exhausting, but by the time he reached the stark, grey room he had been assigned, he was just about ready to collapse. He didn't remember crawling into bed, or turning off the light.

__

"Okay, careful with that cover stone.." a black-haired man stretches upwards, gesturing emphatically with his hands as a huge stone slab is lowered onto the columns around him.

"Yes, Doctor Jackson" the patient, steady voice remains a calm contrast to the nervous energy of the man standing in the display who is so determined to have it exactly perfect for future visitors.

"Pull it this way! This way!" Dr. Jackson moves backwards, walking the crane into place with his gestures, eyes fixed firmly on the underside of the cover stone. The stone seems to slip slightly, and swings madly for a moment. He jumps indignantly forward. "Careful with that cover plate!" he cries.

"Jake, it's swinging a bit" the woman standing next to him shuffles her clipboard and looks up nervously as the chains holding the heavy weight creak overhead. 

Enraptured, he looks on, standing on the walkway, his emotions a curious mixture of excitement and resentment. His parents get all the fun. He wants to be in there, amongst the dirt and the dust, touching that huge stone slab, running his fingers along the grooves in the column, daydreaming about what great kings and emperors once walked past the stone, listening to the whispers in time as great ladies lean against the surface talking to their friends. He didn't ask_ to be so little. Why can't they wait until he's big like them?!_

"Bring this in on the left a little more?" his father is still energetically ordering around men who know their jobs but equally know how well he can get swept up in the moment. "Move it towards the back" he orders. Jake turns to comply and the cover stone almost crashes into a pillar. "Careful!"

"Watch it on your left, okay?" Mom, always more careful, steadier than Dad. He looks at her, eyes wide but she doesn't see him. She's also staring at the cover stone, and trying to help Dad get the cover stone into the perfect position. She's talking to Jake with that tone of voice. That tone she uses when she doesn't want him to run down the sidewalk in the middle of rush hour in case he runs into the road. He knows how dangerous roads are. When will Mom realise that? It's embarrassing the way she makes him hold her hand when they cross the road. He bets she's making Jake feel silly and small too with that tone of voice.

"Jake, can we bring this in?" Dad sounds impatient now. "Careful!" Jake shifts the stone again, and it swings with the machine's movements. "Bring it down... let's look at the front..."

"It's.. it's swinging..." his eyes snap back to Mom again. He's losing enjoyment watching them do this. He's getting bored, and Mom is worried. He can see that. Even from here. Mom's usually so calm. He doesn't like it when she's worried. It frightens him. He moves a step forward. He wants to reassure her that everything's okay, but he's not allowed to come any closer. He's too little to be taken seriously.

"It's okay. It's fine. We're fine." He relaxes and smiles again as Dad reassures Mom it's going to be okay. "Careful!" 

"A bit more level, Jake" Mom agrees with Dad this time. She sounds calmer again, and he knows Dad is right. The stone is almost in place, everything's going to be okay. A few more moments and he'll be allowed to join them and touch the stone pillars like he's wanted to ever since seeing them.

Dad is starting to speak again, giving Jake more instructions. He can't hear what Dad is saying because there's a loud crunch above him. The chains rattle and suddenly fall away. There's a loud thump and a horrible groaning sound. He's standing alone in a cloud of dust, and the sound of his mother's scream is a sound that will haunt his nightmares for the rest of his life...

"Mom! Dad!" his cry reverberated around the room, and he came to, curled against his pillow, gripping it so tightly pain was lancing up his wrists. For several moments, he couldn't breathe. _What was that? What the hell was that? _He looked around the room, barely able to see through his tears. There was a dark shape on the opposite side of the room, something he couldn't focus on. Angrily he rubbed the back of his hands across his eyes. _Oh God..._ he scrambled off the bed, almost flying across the room to the trunk. The trunk he had not been able to face opening ever since Doctor Fraiser had brought it out of storage. The trunk that would reveal to him who he was.

He hadn't wanted to know then but now, now with his cry hanging in the air, his cheeks chilled by tears, feeling a pain so acute he thought he was going to die, he didn't stop to wonder why he was so afraid to face his past.

The heavy lid creaked as he flung it open, and began digging through the neatly stacked things. _Where are they?!_ he scrambled through the items without paying any attention to them until he came to a flat wooden box. Hauling the lid off it, he found what he was looking for. Photographs.

Dragging the box out of the trunk, he set it on the bed and began pulling them out, hunting through them. Photos of SG-1, of people in brown desert robes, of him sat on an alien beast... _mastedge_... his brain supplied, but he didn't pay attention. It wasn't important now. His hand froze as it touched a face, a dusky face, glowing with health, regally facing the camera, a little confused but beautiful in that confusion, framed by a mane of dark hair, her features dominated by large, dark eyes he wanted to fall into and never surface from....

__

Sha're...he paused and touched the picture again and his pain intensified. No time to explore that now. He carefully placed the picture to one side instead of adding it to the discarded pile, and resumed his search.

Suddenly, his hands trembled. _Oh God, oh God, oh God..._it was them. Tall, dark haired, face made stern by thick frames that hid his eyes. A shaggy, rugged look to him that was softened by the smaller, equally dishevelled blue-eyed woman stood next to him. Her hair was long and blonde, the same colour as his own and he felt tears well up again. "Oh God..." he whispered, sagging against the evidence that proved his nightmare was true. 

Something slid, a sharp corner digging him in the knee as if fell off the bed. For a moment, he stared at Sha're's picture as it lay on the floor beside him, then slowly, he reached out to pick it up, feeling the pain intensify until it was a flame that threatened to consume him. "You too" he whispered softly. The two pictures trembled under the weight of the teardrops that slipped off his nose and he quickly rubbed them across his chest, to dry them. 

Stumbling to his feet, he crawled back into his bed, hugging the pictures close to him. Was this the monster in his mind? The one that made him too terrified to try and unlock the memories that were denied him? He settled against the pillow and looked at them. He had watched his parents die in front of his eyes, unable to save them. He had watched his wife die in front of his eyes, unable to save her. This was old pain, pain he had learned to live with, but in the new rush of old memories, it was pain he found himself reliving again. As intensely as the day he first experienced them, and he was helpless against the torrent consuming him.

__

Please God, let this be the monster... he closed his eyes and curled up around his pain. He couldn't bear it if there was anything worse to come.


	9. An Enemy Unmasked

****

Chapter 9

The forest was eerily silent as the three men crept carefully through the undergrowth. O'Neill found it strangely comforting, it meant they were in the right area for locating Jaffa activity. Not that he felt it was necessarily a good thing to be creeping up on a bunch of bad guys that outnumbered them so overwhelmingly but since it had to be done, he wanted nature on his side. _Ya hear that, Oma?_ He thought dryly. _How about sending us a little of that light show you used at Kheb?_ He caught his thoughts before they could run too far away. Thinking of Oma made him think about the Ancients, which made him think about that last confrontation with Anubis' forces that had led to the destruction of Abydos. Inevitably, that led to him to other questions that he couldn't answer.

__

"Remember that fine line we discussed?"

Why the hell was it that Oma could play games at Kheb but put the fear of God - _Ancients... glowy all-powerful beings... whatever_ - into Daniel to prevent him from helping them? And what had happened to him when he had crossed the line? Orlin had given up Ascension for Carter, but Carter hadn't noticed him suffer any kind of memory loss. Was that because he had willingly given up Ascension for mortality? Did that mean that Daniel had _not_ given up Ascension willingly? If so, did that mean that Daniel would resent being mortal when his memory returned? Would Daniel's memory return?

__

"Cross it!"

Was Daniel being punished for something that was _his_ fault? O'Neill's brow furrowed. It was the question he had been asking himself ever since they had found Jackson living as a native on a planet they had only just learned the gate address for. At first, they had been stunned to see him there. Breathing. But it had been nothing to the horrible sinking sensation that had set in when they realised he didn't have a clue who they were, that he didn't trust them. That he _feared_ them. It hadn't required a genius to connect Daniel's current predicament with the events that had destroyed Abydos. Dammit, he had forced Daniel down this road; he was responsible for his friend's vulnerability now. Why couldn't he ever leave well enough alone?

__

Dammit Jack, Daniel came to you. He's the one who told you about the Eye of Ra. He's the one who wouldn't let the subject drop. What was he thinking? He knew the cost. He came anyway. Because Ascension couldn't change who he is. And if death can't change it, neither can memory loss.

So why did he have that sneaking, irrational suspicion that death was somehow easier to recover from than amnesia?

"Jack?" Jacob whispered. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing" the Colonel growled back.

The Tok'ra raised both eyebrows. "Right" he said in a tone that indicated he wasn't buying it. Instead he turned to Teal'c. "How close?"

"We have arrived" the Jaffa murmured and cautiously slowed his pace as the trees began thinning.

The Tok'ra and Colonel joined him immediately as they skirted the trees and sank to the earth, sliding their way to the top of the rise to peer through the bushes.

O'Neill's heart sank as he saw the sight. Their ship was gutted, they could see that immediately. Jaffa milled around its remains, obviously patrolling, while three stood in the centre of the clearing discussing their findings. His eyes riveted on the back on the nearest Jaffa. There was something curiously familiar about those shoulders, that easy, arrogant stance, the tone of voice floating across the intervening space...

He glanced at Teal'c who nodded grimly in recognition. O'Neill scanned the area once more then gestured for them to fall back. Once he felt confident they could whisper without being overheard, he stopped.

"I didn't see their faces" Jacob whispered harshly. "We still don't know who they are"

"Oh, I'd recognise Her'ak's magnetic charm anywhere" O'Neill muttered.

"Who?"

"Her'ak. First-Prime-of-Anubis-Her'ak."

"Anubis?" Jacob sighed. "Great" he paused. "Wait, isn't Her'ak the Jaffa who killed Khonsu of Amon Shek?"

"Indeed" Teal'c said grimly.

"Right" Jacob muttered grimly. "Okay, we're certain these are Anubis' Jaffa?"

"Oh yes"

"I concur"

"We need to know how many are here"

"The al'kesh landed over there" O'Neill pointed further into the trees. "Any chance of them having a cargo ship just laying around for us to use?"

"Doubtful. But if you want to look, knock yourself out"

O'Neill gave him a dark look. "You're an inspiration, Jacob."

"You're not so bad yourself" Jacob replied blandly.

"It would be wise for us to remove ourselves from this location" Teal'c interrupted. "Come" he moved off, heading deeper into the forest, moving more silently than expected for a man of his size.

O'Neill's eyebrows lifted then he moved quickly after the Jaffa, Jacob bringing up the rear.

The going was slow and tough as it quickly became clear Jaffa were everywhere in the local vicinity. When they eventually paused, the al'kesh was still in the distance. O'Neill scanned the area through his binoculars and winced. There was no way they were going to get close to that ship. He looked at the others and shook his head. "It's practically an army" he whispered.

"An army of young Jaffa" Teal'c observed thoughtfully. "It would appear this planet is to become a training facility."

"So. Green then?" O'Neill squinted at the al'kesh. "Better news than it could be. But not so great I want to risk us getting caught by trying to get any closer"

"The al'kesh appears to be the only vessel capable of space travel" The Jaffa continued. "Unless we attempt to take control of it, we are trapped on this planet"

"Unless Carter and Jonas can get the Stargate working"

"How will they translate the symbols, Jack?" Jacob asked. "Sam's good, but she tried to translate the Earth gate for two years and didn't succeed" he paused and an odd expression crossed his face. He didn't say anything and O'Neill suspected he was having an argument with Selmak.

"Daniel translated the gate in two weeks" O'Neill retorted.

"Unfortunately, Jack, Daniel can't help us right now"

"How long will it take the Tok'ra to attempt to locate us if we do not initiate contact?" Teal'c asked as O'Neill sighed.

"If they don't hear anything from me in the next few days, they might begin worrying" Jacob looked around thoughtfully. "We could be here a while"

"Great" muttered O'Neill. He rose. "Let's go."

The others weren't any more enthusiastic when they heard the report. "Well, sir, I've stockpiled our supplies and begun to rig the doorways and tunnels just in case. I don't fancy the idea of sealing myself in here, so we've been finding out how big this complex is"

"And?"

"There's a lot of levels" Quinn replied. "This place is _big_ and deep. It's like a maze. Anise took us around so we wouldn't get lost. They haven't even finished exploring the place yet. It could take years."

"The tunnels seem to extend back the way we came from, however. I think some of these caverns extend right underneath the Stargate" Carter continued. "And the other caverns don't seem to have the same amount of decoration this room has"

"Meaning?"

"Meaning we might be able to tunnel up to the surface if we have to, sir"

"Okay, so we don't have to worry about getting trapped down here. What about food and water?"

"The Tok'ra showed us where we can get fresh water. There's a limited supply of forest plants they've discovered are edible. With that to supplement our rations, we should be able to subsist for a couple of weeks. After that, sir, we're going to have leave here and look for food elsewhere."

"Hopefully, we'll have the Stargate working by then, right Carter?"

She exchanged a dubious glance with Quinn.

"Carter?"

"We might have to go back to the Stargate to learn anything useful about it" Quinn said. "I've gone through everything I've brought with me regarding the symbols on the devices, and I'm going through the notes the Tok'ra have taken. It's nothing I've experienced. The Tok'ra don't know what it means either and they've been here longer than we have. Un...."

"Jonas" O'Neill's tone was flat. "In case I didn't make myself clear, we're out of options. An army of Jaffa control the only working ship on this planet. The Stargate is our only way out of here. If you and Carter can't make it work, we're going to be playing cat and mouse with Anubis for the rest of our lives. And I _really_ don't like that option"

Quinn and Carter exchanged a look. "We'll do our best, sir" Carter said, feigning confidence.

"I will help you" Sin offered bringing his equipment over to Carter and Quinn.

"Ilithya and I will continue exploring this complex" Anise explained to Jacob and O'Neill. "We may yet find something of benefit to us"

O'Neill watched Carter, Quinn and the Tok'ra set up near one of the dog statues, then turned to look around the room. Decoding the Stargate was going to take a while, if it was even possible. He nodded to Teal'c and the pair joined Anise and Ilithya. Before he made plans for defending or fleeing this place he wanted to know exactly what kind of terrain he was dealing with. By the sounds of it, this was going to take almost as long as decoding the Stargate.


	10. Morning After

****

Chapter 10

The commissary was decidedly busy when Feretti entered at lunchtime. He paused for a moment, scanning the room but couldn't see any sign of Jackson. Glancing at his watch, he noticed he was a little late, so made his way across to the food to study the selection.

"Now is that an art or a science?"

"What?" Feretti straightened and turned around to find his second-in-command, behind him looking amused.

"Deciding what to eat" Eckford grinned. "It looks very serious"

"Executive decision. Pie or clubhouse?"

"Pie is good"

"Clubhouse it is, then"

"Don't trust me, sir?"

"Everywhere except in the commissary, Captain" Feretti replied blandly. Eckford chuckled. "Something on your mind, Eckford?"

"Well, now that you mention it, yes sir. Any word on how SG-1's doing?"

"No word yet. We're still on stand-by"

"Yes, sir. If you're eating now, you're welcome to join us. The betting pool on whether SG-1 gets themselves into trouble has doubled"

Feretti smiled wryly. "Maybe some other time" he frowned slightly. "You haven't seen Daniel in here today have you?"

Eckford looked startled. "No, sir. Haven't seen him all day. But then, that's nothing new"

"Meaning what?"

"Since coming back, sir. He's been avoiding company. Almost no-one's seen him, except for the Doc, and that's only because she has to drag him into the infirmary for check-ups"

"Remember he's not himself right now, Captain"

"Yes, sir"

Feretti glanced at his watch again then considered the reaction to Jackson's appearance in the archaeology labs the day before. Was it possible Jackson was too afraid of other people to go for lunch? "I'll catch you later, Eckford" he said absently and walked out of the commissary again.

He considered his options for a moment, then decided to try Jackson's quarters first. It didn't take him long to get there, and he could see a light shining underneath the door before he arrived. He wasn't entirely certain whether to be surprised or not when no one answered his knocking. He knocked once more and waited, then gently gave the door a push and peeked in.

The first thing Feretti noticed were the books scattered on the bed. The second thing he noticed were the two photographs lying on top of the one book. He recognised the photograph of Sha're immediately but the man and the woman were unfamiliar to him. Given the outdated style of their clothing and the features that seemed oddly familiar, he considered it a safe bet to assume they were Jackson's parents.

Jackson himself was sat at the desk, feet propped up on the trunk by the wall, reading intently. He appeared so absorbed in whatever it was he was doing that he actually jumped when Feretti cleared his throat.

"Um, hi" he said in surprise.

"Hey" Feretti studied him thoughtfully, noticing the circles underneath the eyes. "Rough night?"

"Something like that" a peculiar smile flitted across Jackson's lips briefly before it vanished again. "Oh!" he glanced at his watch. "I'm late" he rose quickly and put the book down, a little reluctantly, Feretti thought.

"No problem" he stepped back out of the room, and waited for Jackson to follow him. They were silent for most of the journey to the commissary. The Major noticed that Jackson seemed to be unfocused, as if in his own little world.

"So, um, what was all that?"

Jackson smiled tightly. "Diaries. Of my childhood."

"Figures" Feretti chuckled.

"What?"

"That'd you'd keep diaries of your life" he looked at Jackson. "So, does reading them help?"

"They did this morning"

Feretti came to a stop and turned to face him, searching his face intently. "Your memory?"

Jackson shook his head but he was smiling nevertheless. "I can remember my childhood," he admitted, moving into the commissary.

"You can? Well, that's great!" Feretti joined him and pulled out the clubhouse he had been eyeing hungrily earlier. With amusement, he noticed that Jackson almost automatically reached for the pie and homed in on the only empty table left in the commissary. Feretti noticed the stares and whispers but this time, it appeared as if Jackson either didn't notice or, hopefully, didn't care. "Anything else?"

Jackson shook his head. "A few. More recent" a shadow of something flitted across his features, an emotion that was almost bittersweet. "But mostly just old memories. Doctor Fraiser said the old ones would probably come back first"

"What happened? I mean yesterday..."

"Yeah." Jackson was suddenly concentrating on his food, some of the excitement gone from his tone again.

"Forget I said it" Feretti said immediately, realising something was bothering the archaeologist after all.

"It's okay" he took a deep breath. "I've had this shadow. In my mind. Like a... a..." he paused, searching for the words. "Monster, I keep calling it. It sounds stupid I know, but I was afraid to go there, try and remember. I just knew there was something horrible hiding there" he glanced up nervously and found Feretti staring at him in surprise. He swallowed. "Anyway, last night, I started having nightmares. I got to see that monster, teeth, bad breath and everything"

"What was it?" Feretti breathed.

"Bad memories" Jackson shrugged lightly, although his face looked strained. "My parents deaths, Sha're's death. It was like I was going through it all for the first time."

"Oh God" Feretti suddenly understood the bittersweet expression that had been flitting across Jackson's features ever since they had left his quarters.

Jackson tried to smile but it was more of a grimace. "It's old pain. It was just... a shock remembering it like that"

"I'll bet. Are you okay?"

"Fine"

Feretti knew that tone. He had heard Jackson use it on O'Neill many times in the past. It was that tone that said 'I'm not really, but I'm touched you asked and I know I'll be okay eventually'.

Jackson took another deep breath. "On the bright side, I think that's the worst of it. I can't imagine I've got anything worse up here than the knowledge I couldn't save the lives of my parents or wife" it almost ended in a question.

Feretti smiled wryly. "I don't know you as well as the Colonel does, but I think you're right there. I can't think of anything right now that would be worse than what you've just said"

Jackson relaxed slightly. "Good" his relief was obvious.

"No more nightmares, huh?"

"Well, I wouldn't know about that, but at least I can enjoy this pie now"

Feretti almost choked into his drink at that and a few people glanced over at their table, as the Major spluttered and regained his breath. "Don't, whatever you do, pull an Urgo on us" Feretti managed when he could finally speak.

"Urgo?"

"Right" Feretti began to grin. "I can't wait to see your face when you remember that one"

Jackson was looking at him, eyebrows raised in a mixture of exasperation and amusement. "What happened?"

"Oh no. You can remember that one all by yourself" Feretti laughed, then changed the subject as he saw a hint of familiar stubbornness appearing in Jackson's eyes. "Are you interested in finishing with those reports today, or are you going to stick with the diaries?"

Jackson looked thoughtful for a moment. "I think I'll finish looking through that trunk Janet gave me. I think it's more important right now"

Feretti was silent for a moment. He had noticed the archaeologist's use of the CMO's first name, something that hailed back to the days before his Ascension. Jackson didn't seem to notice, however, so the Major wasn't sure if the slip had been instinctive or a sign the archaeologist was finally beginning to settle back into the SGC. "Yeah. It probably is" he agreed soberly.

They ate in silence for the rest of the meal and didn't speak again until they parted ways at the commissary entrance. 

"Good luck, Daniel. With the diaries, I mean"

Jackson felt a nervous flutter in his stomach at that comment. _Isn't the worst over? Do I still need luck to get through the rest of this?_ He swallowed and nodded. "Thanks." 

__

No harm taking it. Just in case.


	11. Decisions

****

Chapter 11

The window was a narrow, earthy channel that was wider on the inside than it was on the outside. From where they were, she could see across a huge expanse of terrain. Even the Stargate's dark metallic sheen was visible in the distance, rising out of a broad field of gently waving yellow grass. From this distance, it looked like a sea of maize.

She couldn't see the downed tel'tak from this location, and the clouds of smoke that had drifted into view during its demolition were long since gone. She also noticed the sky was much cleaner than when they had first arrived. Whatever had caused the slow death of the vegetation around the Stargate and the absence of animal life had nothing to with the brief volcanic activity the Tok'ra had mentioned. 

Jaffa were often in view. They were coming steadily closer to their location by the day. They had found the Stargate, but after a cursory inspection of it, had left it alone. She had watched them through her binoculars, to see if they showed any familiarity with it but there was no evidence of that. Infact, their lack of interest in the Stargate reinforced a little pessimistic voice inside her head that the gate was as useless as the Tok'ra thought it was. So far, they hadn't found any traces of the Tok'ra or SG-1's presence and seemed in no hurry to locate the owners of the craft they had destroyed.

She ran a hand through her blonde hair and turned back to study the room. Ra's sun disk was a blaze of angry red on the wall above the golden throne and seemed to dominate the room as the light from the window struck it. _Maybe that's the point_ she decided. _Maybe Ra wanted to dominate this room even when he was absent? _She hadn't been on the first mission to Abydos so had never met Ra, but she had heard the stories from the Colonel and Daniel, and even from Feretti and Kawalsky. Ra had definitely been a Goa'uld who had wanted his presence felt.

She sighed as she thought of Abydos and wondered if the feisty Skaara would accept Ascension better than Daniel had. She winced as she thought of Daniel, alone at the SGC. He was family. They should have been there, helping him through one of the most vulnerable times in his life. How frightened must he be, being alone among strangers who knew more about him than he did? He had no living family and SG-1 had been his substitute - siblings, mentors, and closest friends. Now they were here, trapped amongst Jaffa on a distant planet, while he suffered in isolation at home.

"I do not believe the Stargate here was ever designed to function in the manner of other Stargates" the distorted male voice drifted back into her consciousness and she looked down. Sin and Quinn were arguing again. They had been arguing for the past three days and part of it, Carter knew, was because they were trapped underground. The frustration of living in almost perpetual darkness, eating a limited variety of food and with little to do aside from explore the complex, puzzle out the Stargate and avoid Jaffa patrols was beginning to wear on them all. Both O'Neill and Jacob were becoming increasingly sarcastic, Anise was growing more unbearable by the hour and the debates between the three working on the Stargate had long since lost their veneer of scientific respectability and were fast approaching open warfare. Even Teal'c was becoming increasingly isolated, patrolling the complex alone or taking the time to meditate. 

She wondered if he continued to meditate out of habit, from nearly a century of carrying a Goa'uld larva, or whether he was just seeking the politest method of avoiding antagonism with his colleagues.

"Why?" The Kelownan's voice was flat. It had _that_ tone in it. That tone he had used when he had stalled SG-1's investigation into the cause of Jackson's terrible injuries on Kelownia a year ago. It was a tone she had only heard occasionally since but which she had come to recognise as meaning he was frustrated. Usually it meant he agreed with a situation he was unable to support but those who didn't know him as well as she did often mistook it for bigoted antagonism. "Look, right now, I'm not seeing what you're seeing. That Stargate has everything a normal Stargate has _except_ a DHD. If we can create a DHD, _why_ wouldn't it work? Theoretically."

She moved down the steps to rejoin them, listening to Sin's reply.

"The presence of naquadria in the Stargate's design. Naquadria is an extremely unstable radioactive substance. It would have a destabilising effect on any wormholes engaged" Sin gestured. "That's if the energy requirements for creating a stable wormhole in the first place didn't cause the whole thing to explode on activation"

"So, you're saying they built a full sized replica, down to the tiniest details and set it in a naquadria-lined naquadah plinth for show? Why go to that trouble? Wouldn't it be easier to just build a normal, real, Stargate?"

"Jonas has a point" Carter said. "Why use naquadria and naquadah in a fake?"

Sin shook his head and sighed, moving away and stretching his back muscles. 

"Alright" Quinn folded his hands in front of his stomach and frowned. "We're not getting anywhere. How do Stargates work?"

Carter raised her eyebrows. "Okay. Well... basically, the inner ring is energised to react with neutrinos. The spin concentrates the gravitational energy required for the creation of an artificial wormhole that transfers charged matter streams along lines of force in a single direction along an extra-dimensional conduit."

"Right and a DHD...?"

"Provides the power necessary to activate the wormhole and the information needed to establish one to another Stargate"

"So when we don't have a DHD....?"

"We can manually dial the gate itself but without an energy source to activate it, we won't be able to use it"

"So, basically what you're saying is that we need an energy source."

"Yes. Well. That and to translate the glyphs so we can attempt a manual dial"

Sin had been listening to this in silence, occasionally shaking his head. Suddenly he stepped forward, one hand raised to stop their flow. "Given our current predicament, where do you envisage our power coming from?"

There was silence. The three looked at each other uncertainly.

"What about the tel'tak?" Quinn asked after a moment.

Carter looked thoughtfully. "We'd need to get a closer look at it. They could have destroyed its power source. If they've just made sure it will never fly again, then we might be able to salvage enough energy from the crystals to power the Stargate. Once, possibly twice" she paused. "We'll need some way of harnessing the energy to the Stargate as well"

"How will you achieve that without the Stargate exploding?" Sin asked dryly.

Carter paused. That was indeed the question.

"Who's exploding Stargates?"

The three turned sharply to find the others had finally returned from their foray into the tunnels. O'Neill was advancing on them, eyebrows raised.

"Uh... well, sir... we have three problems with the Stargate that we need to overcome if we're going to get off this planet" Carter began. "The first problem is lack of energy to power the gate. The only source of energy that might provide enough for us to manually dial out is in the tel'tak."

"Assuming Her'ak hasn't had it destroyed" O'Neill interrupted.

"Yes, sir...."

"And if we can get it out of the tel'tak without the Jaffa catching us"

"Exactly, sir. We also need to find a way of channelling the energy to the Stargate"

"No Meaning-of-Life solution?"

Carter smiled at the confusion that flashed across Quinn's face. Their escape from Heliopolis had been years before they had met the Kelownan and while he had probably read about the mission, she doubted even the Colonel's report had referred to the method they used to escape P3X-927 as the 'Meaning of Life solution'. "No, sir. I haven't seen rain since we arrived. I don't think we can count on a storm this time."

"Alright, Carter. What else?"

"The second problem is that even if we get an energy source and find a way to attach it to the Stargate, we still need to translate the glyphs, associate them with Earth's address and find the point of origin for this planet before we can manually dial out."

The Colonel's eyebrows rose at that. "And the third problem?"

"Well, sir. As Sin was saying when you arrived, even if we manage to overcome the first two problems, the presence of traces of naquadria in the dais means any energy we channel into the Stargate could cause a chain reaction. The resulting explosion would probably destroy the whole plateau the Stargate is on, and us right along with it"

O'Neill stared at her. "Woah" he managed after a moment. "Well... we don't want to do that, Carter."

Her expression was wry but she knew she didn't need to answer that.

"Can you find a way to activate the Stargate without turning us into sushi?" Jacob asked in the silence.

"Well. I need to know what energy source we end up with and what equipment we will need to channel the output. I won't know until then, Dad."

O'Neill nodded. "In that case we better investigate the tel'tak for supplies" he scanned the room. "Okay, people. Listen up. Teal'c, Jacob, Carter, you're with me. Jonas. I want you, Anise, Sin and Ilithya to stay here and work on translating the glyphs. Keep your heads down and out of sight until we return. Okay?"

There were nods all round, so O'Neill slipped his gun over his shoulder. "Okay kids, let's tool up."


	12. Floodgates

****

Chapter 12

In a world where political correctness was a slogan, many people trained themselves to see different shades of grey in every situation. Still others clung desperately to old traditional values of good and evil, black and white. Us and Them. Feretti had always considered himself to be a simple man, with simple values. He understood the world around him and the world, he thought, knew him. He, for instance, was a warrior; called to service by a country he loved to protect a way of life he believed in. It wasn't that he didn't have time for scientists or philosophers, it was just that they didn't have any place in his life. _He_ wasn't one of _Them_, after all.

Then he had been recruited into the Stargate Programme and his world had turned upside down. Suddenly, black and white blurred into grey. Bad people could do good things in the face of true evil and the lives of a unit of warriors would depend on the moral fortitude of a single scientist. And since that time, he had discovered that even The One True Evil wasn't as polarised as he had thought, for even amongst this evil race, there were those who fought for good. They weren't human. They didn't have human values. They didn't even agree with humans most of the time, and God only knew that Feretti found it hard to agree with them. But there they were. The Tok'ra. Goa'uld. Them - but really Us.

Feretti wasn't a stupid man. He had understood the concept and science of the Stargate when it had been explained to him. He had understood swiftly the ramifications of Dr. Jackson's inability to locate the point of origin for Abydos and explained it to the rest of O'Neill's men. But he prided himself on enjoying simple things. He hated complications. The universe made sense when it was Humanity versus Goa'uld. But now it was Humanity versus Goa'uld Except Tok'ra and what made it worse was that even the Tok'ra could be fooled by a Tok'ra who was really Goa'uld, or not realise when a Goa'uld was really Tok'ra. 

The Tok'ra were a wrinkle in an otherwise easily understood situation. Feretti knew he shouldn't resent them for that, for sharing the goals of Earth, but dammit, they made it so _easy_ to hate them.

Like now. Aja. Iris. Whatever. She was standing in the middle of the archaeology labs, arguing with the human archaeologists over those damned artefacts from P5-2M7. Shambhala. _Whatever_. 

"What the hell is going on?" he demanded, walking into a scene that looked as though it would end with the scientists lynching the Tok'ra.

"Apparently, Tok'ra alliances believe in us sharing with them as long as they don't share with us" Moore may have been a civilian but he also had the highest clearance of any of the archaeologists currently in the room. He turned on Feretti. "If they aren't going to share the information, they can stop expecting our scientists to help them. We can't work under these conditions"

"You have been told all that is required for you to do your duties" Iris replied, her distorted voice even and calm.

"Science is all about truth!" Moore rounded back on her. "You're asking us to work blind. _How_ can we begin to assess your theories of the cultural development of P5-2M7 when we didn't even know there was a Stargate present to affect that development?!"

"A Stargate that doesn't work and so is useless"

"_For how long_?! Christ, woman. Just because modern humans don't know how to build Stonehenge, doesn't mean we never used it!"

The Tok'ra's eyes flashed gold but the archaeologist was in full flow now and beyond being intimidated.

"ENOUGH!" Feretti yelled. "Get a grip! All of you!"

He waited until he was sure the six people in the room were silent but continued to glare at them. "Moore, is that the basic problem here? That you didn't know the Stargate existed?"

"Yes. But we..."

Feretti cut him off by turning on Iris. "And the existence of the Stargate _is_ all you've been hiding, right?"

"Yes, as I have...."

"Fine" Feretti stared hard at all of them. "You now have all the information you need to do your jobs. No more secrets, no more arguments. Next time I hear of any crap like this being thrown around, I'll be making my complaints official. Got it?"

He waited for the verbal confirmation from all of them, including the Tok'ra before shaking his head and stepping outside the room again. Maybe now wasn't the best time to be in a room full of scientists. He was turning to leave when he met an amused looking Doctor Fraiser standing patiently in the corridor.

"Doctor"

"Major. I don't suppose Doctor Jackson is in there?"

"Not that I saw" Feretti replied.

She frowned. "You haven't seen him?"

"Not today. Why?"

"He's late for an appointment" she shook her head in puzzlement. "I've heard he's been spending most of his time recently with you and that he's been seen here. But if you haven't seen him, he's not here or in his quarters, and no-one's seen him in the commissary, I'm... at a loss."

Feretti shook his head. "I don't know what to tell you, Doc. He hasn't left the base has he?"

"No" she sounded distracted. "He can't"

"Have you tried Colonel O'Neill's office or quarters?"

"Why would I look there, Major?"

"I don't know. He seemed to be refamiliarising himself with the past. The Colonel's his closest friend on the base, maybe he went to his office to jog his memory?" he paused as the diminutive doctor's eyes widened. 

She grabbed him and propelled him into an empty room where they could talk without being overheard. "He's started remembering?"

"Uh... he didn't tell you?"

"No. No, he didn't" she rubbed her forehead. "When did this start happening?"

"Well, three days ago he came to these labs for the first time, and the following day mentioned having had dreams about the deaths of his parents and Sha're. He said he could remember his childhood. I thought he was going through that trunk you gave him. He had been the day I found out."

She was frowning. "Yes. I saw the diaries on his bed"

"Well, his memory coming back is a good thing, right?" Feretti was becoming worried by the Doctor's lack of enthusiasm at the news. "I mean... he said he'd been afraid of remembering, but once he...."

"He said what?"

The Major stammered to a stop as Fraiser suddenly seemed to almost grow in size at his reaction. _How can such a tiny woman be so intimidating?_ It wasn't the first time he had ever wondered that. He cleared his throat. "Uh... well, that's what he said."

"What did he say exactly?"

"Uh... right" Feretti frowned, trying to remember what Jackson's exact words had been. He shook his head. "Something about having a bad feeling, like a monster with big teeth. It made him afraid to try and remember. But the dreams he had of his parents and Sha're's deaths seemed to help. He said recovering the memories was like he relived them all over again. But it seemed to take the fear of remembering away. He remembered the bad stuff first, so it's all good, right?" he looked into her worried features. "Doc?"

"I'm not a psychiatrist, Feretti but I can tell you that when a patient begins recovering their memories, they can undergo rapid mood-swings and behavioural changes as the memories return. What has his behaviour been like recently?"

"Quiet, mostly" Feretti said. She gave him an impatient look and he suddenly realised she wanted more. He frowned. "Okay. He's been distant, quiet. You have to talk to him to get him to speak at all. Eckford said he's been avoiding crowded places... and actually, he admitted the same. When we walked into the archaeology lab the other day, everyone stared at him. He didn't show it then, but when he was alone he almost collapsed. He looked like a wreck. Didn't say much about it, come to think of it, just he was used to that happening every time he entered a room. He's been avoiding people because of it"

She nodded, her face now grim, eyes narrowed in thought. "From what I've heard, the only time people see him, he's either standing alone in the briefing room watching the Stargate, or is with you. What does he do when he can't go to the briefing room or you're busy?"

Feretti started to answer, then his eyes widened. "I don't know. I didn't think to ask him..." he paused. "He's been avoiding people. Maybe he spends all that time alone in his room? God, I didn't think."

"Has he been irritable? Tired? Do you know if he's sleeping?"

"He looked tired two days ago, but that was when he admitted to having had nightmares about his parents and Sha're. I haven't seen him since, and I didn't think to ask him how he's been sleeping before. Daniel and sleep never went together but aside from being quiet and nervous I don't think he's really displayed much emotion. Oh, except for one time, when he picked up a book on.. Mexican history, or something. He seemed like the old Daniel then"

"But that was the only time?"

"Yeah, pretty much"

She considered that for a moment, muttering to herself. "Okay. So. Avoidance, nightmares, possible sleeplessness, subdued behaviour, increased nervousness, possibly... no" she shook her head. "I need him in the infirmary as soon as possible, Feretti."

He frowned. "Doc, what's wrong? Is something wrong?"

"I might be overreacting but I'd like to be sure" she admitted. "Who has seen him or spoken to him since his return aside from SG-1 and you?"

Feretti was silent for several moments. "Aside from you and General Hammond, I can't think of anyone"

She sighed. "Okay. Feretti, help me look for Daniel. You think we should start with Colonel O'Neill's office?"

"Yeah, sure. He was closer to the Colonel than anyone else"

The pace at which she led her taller companion was nothing less than a forced march. On arriving at Colonel O'Neill's office, they found it empty. Subsequent searches of Carter's lab, and checking the private quarters of the SG-1 members, also yielded no luck. Even the brainwave of trying the quarters that had belonged to Jackson before his death failed to locate him.

"You know, there is one place left we haven't tried" Feretti said suddenly. She looked at him. "Jonas' office. It used to be Daniel's lab"

She sucked in a sharp breath. She had been so fixated on finding Jackson and establishing if her fears were founded that she had forgotten that obvious fact. "You're right." she hurried off, Feretti hot on her heels.

The light was off when they entered the lab. Feretti glanced at Fraiser and shrugged. "Guess not" he said absently flicking the switch. Light flared and the room abruptly came into focus.

Quinn had always kept a neater desk than Jackson, although he had collected and hoarded his own store of clutter over the past year. Feretti scanned it. A lot of the things in this room had been Jackson's. All the books that lined the shelves, for instance. Quinn had added to the collection, including his own interests. Unlike Jackson, who had never been an engineer, Quinn's interest in the ethical perspective of science and engineering that had resulted in his original disastrous meeting with SG-1 had made him take an interest in Carter's work and in the fate of the naquadria research on Earth. He had books on engineering and physics that Jackson probably would never have thought of reading.

A cursory scan of the room revealed no sign of activity. It hadn't been occupied for weeks, not since SG-1 had departed with Jacob Carter for P5-2M7. There was nothing to tell Feretti that anyone had been in the room since then, especially not Daniel Jackson. He turned to Fraiser, just as she burst past him with a strangled gasp.

Startled, he stepped through the doorway and looked into the room. Part of the room had been obscured from his view initially and it was to this corner Fraiser ran. She flung the computer chair out of her way as she sank down next to the wall, near the shivering, crumpled heap.

"Daniel?" she reached out, touching his arm, and he jerked away with a cry.

"Don't touch me!" his voice was a hoarse hiss and his eyes flew open to lock onto the doctor's. Fraiser recoiled from the expression in his eyes as though she had been physically hit. Terror. Horror. _Agony_.

"Where?" she whispered, unsettled, feeling Feretti come a step closer. Her eyes ran over what she could see of his body but there was no sign of physical trauma. In this position, that didn't mean anything. She had to get him straightened out, she needed to know if she was going to have to call for a medical team.

"Everywhere. Burns" his head burrowed into his upraised arms again. Something clattered to the ground, but Fraiser was too busy reaching out to touch his forehead with the back of her hand. Again he flinched and moaned in pain at her touch. She did, however, see Feretti bend and pick the fallen item up.

"Daniel. Listen to me. I need to know what happened" her voice was low and urgent. "Feretti, get me a gurney" she hissed, then turned back to Jackson, letting her voice drop to a more soothing tone. "Come on, Daniel. We can help you."

He swallowed, then gasped. "We don't go running to our off-world allies every time an individual's life is at stake"

She stared at him wordlessly then glanced quickly at Feretti. The Major hung up the phone looking as stunned and confused as she felt. "Daniel?" she asked more insistently, reaching up to grasp his shoulder. Immediately his body twisted, an inarticulate shout of pain escaping him. "Help me lay him out" Fraiser exclaimed grabbing him firmly. Feretti immediately jumped forward but even with his help, the pair had to fight to get him into a position where he couldn't hurt himself and only then did they realise the still-struggling man was crying.

"Can you see any injuries?" he gasped.

"Nothing physical" she grated as the medical team arrived. "Help me get him on the gurney and sedated, stat" she called. Feretti jumped back as the medical team took over, then followed them to the infirmary, unable to comprehend what the hell had just happened.


	13. Progress in the Sand

****

Chapter 13

They crouched in the tree line, studying the landscape around the tel'tak carefully. They had slowly followed the trees as far as they could and now they had come to the end of the road. If they wished to advance any further, they would have to break cover. O'Neill scanned the terrain again. It was like a killing ground - there was nowhere to hide. If any Jaffa saw them leave the trees, they would be shot down in seconds. They needed to be absolutely certain there would be no Jaffa in sight and then they would have to run to the ship without stopping.

Currently, approaching the tel'tak didn't seem like an option. Although the Jaffa weren't paying attention to the ship they had gutted, they were in view. The four were hidden in a copse of trees that was somewhat isolated from the main forest. The Jaffa were using the forest itself a little to the south and were often active along the tree line. Although they weren't that close, they were within visual range and if the team was spotted, they would never have enough time to search the ship for any power crystals that might have survived.

All they could do was wait and watch and hope the opportunity to reach the tel'tak would arise. The only other option was to abort the mission and accept they were trapped indefinitely on this world. And O'Neill wasn't ready to make that particular decision just yet.

Settling in a natural hollow, they paired off, taking it in turns to spy on the distant Jaffa while the other pair kept their location as protected as they could without giving their existence away. The hours passed by slowly and it was dark before Teal'c found the opportunity they had been waiting so patiently for.

"O'Neill" his deep voice was a barely audible rumble.

Without a word, O'Neill and Jacob joined them, scanning what they could see of the clearing in the gloomy starlight.

Carter gestured in the direction of the al'kesh to indicate the direction in which the Jaffa had gone. O'Neill stared around the area once more but could see no signs of movement or light sources to indicate anyone might be out there. Quickly, he gestured for the team to move out in their established pairs. Teal'c and Carter both nodded understanding and looked at each other.

Taking a deep breath and keeping low to the ground, Carter stepped out of the trees and charged for the burned-out tel'tak. Squaring his shoulders as he prepared himself, the Jaffa was only a step behind her as she ran.

Silent and tense, O'Neill and Jacob cocked their weapons, ready to lay down cover fire the minute something went wrong.

As she ran, Carter could feel her shoulder blades itching. All around her was empty space, the gloom made shadowy and dark by the veil of trees just beyond her vision. The silence was oppressive, broken only by the sound of her hitting the ground and the hiss of her breath as she tried to keep herself as silent as possible without sacrificing too much speed. Although she knew it was only Teal'c who dogged her steps, she had never felt so vulnerable. _Any moment now, Dad's gonna start shouting and Jaffa are going to start firing before I can do anything. I'm gonna die out here on an alien world with a broken stargate without ever knowing what the Tok'ra were really looking for..._

They skidded to a stop beside the doors to the tel'tak and Teal'c quickly began working on getting the crystals to respond to his commands. Then they were inside, the door hissing shut behind them, staring at each other in relief.

The moment didn't last long. Ever alert, Teal'c turned sharply, staff weapon at the ready, scanning his surroundings in case any Jaffa were inside. Taking no chances herself, Carter took in her surroundings quickly, not relaxing her guard.

Teal'c nodded to her, indicating he detected nothing amiss and began to studying the state the interior was in. From the outside, the ship hadn't looked too badly damaged. Inside, however, the walls were blackened and scorched. The interactive consoles had been ripped clean and pounded out of shape. Even the chairs had been ripped out and torn up.

"Major Carter, there appears to be less damage in the cargo areas," Teal'c observed from the doorway between the cargo hold and the control centre. Carter moved across towards him and studied the space. "Less equipment required to leave orbit and enter hyperspace," she replied and the Jaffa nodded in silent agreement.

"Do you believe there is anything we can salvage?" he asked instead.

Carter sighed. "It's not looking too good, is it?" she let her gun drop back against her torso and began taking a closer look at the computer. The hyperspace generator had been destroyed utterly, as had the navigation controls and ignition. She was about to give up when she noticed something that didn't look as badly damaged. Ruthlessly quashing the sense of hope she was starting to feel, she began removing the damaged crystal interface so she could get a better look.

"Major Carter, the crystals that control the ring platform appear to be undamaged." Teal'c observed, entering the room again.

"That's great, Teal'c." She held up an undamaged arrangement of crystals with a wry smile. "They didn't destroy the self-destruct technology either."

"Indeed." Teal'c raised an eyebrow at that. "Will these crystals provide enough energy to activate the Stargate?"

Carter frowned as she considered the comparative power of the crystals they had compiled. "Well" she mused. "Goa'uld crystal technology has a far more efficient energy storage capacity than anything we currently have on Earth. We _did_ manage to get the Alpha Gate activated with two 6-cylinder multifuel 210-horsepowered turbo engines..."

One of Teal'c's eyebrows was rising. "I see"

Carter bit back a grin at his tone of voice. It was the tone he reserved for those times he regretted asking a question and preferred to end the conversation rather than admit he still didn't understand. "The answer's yes, Teal'c." she clarified.

"I do not see anything we can utilise to connect the crystals to the Stargate," he continued.

She sighed at his inquisitive expression. "Neither do I." She quickly packed the crystals away and gave the interior of the tel'tak one last look. There really wasn't anything they could use to connect the crystals up to the Stargate. Deciding that they needed to get what they had successfully salvaged back to safety first, she activated her radio. "Colonel, come in."

~Go ahead, Carter~

"We've got the crystals. We'll have to worry about how to transfer the energy to the gate when we get back, sir. There's nothing here we can use."

~Understood. There's no Jaffa outside, get back here~

"On our way, sir." She ended the communication and nodded to Teal'c. Taking a deep breath, she cautiously exited the tel'tak, the Jaffa close beside her. Pausing only to reseal the entrance, they quickly hurried back to the waiting pair and all four quickly slid off into the forest while the going was still clear.

It was dawn by the time they finally arrived back at the underground complex that had become their base camp. Carter quickly explained the crystals were all they had been able to salvage from the cargo ship.

"How are the glyphs coming?" Jacob asked the group that had remained behind.

Three Tok'ra and one Kelownan shared a series of frustrated glances. "There's nothing in these chambers to give us a reference for translating the glyphs on the gate." Quinn replied. "But we did realise something," he nodded to Anise, who held out the two amulets that had rested on the staff rising out of the golden dais in the sixth chamber.

"These amulets are made out of the same red quartzite material that forms the master control crystal in most DHDs," Anise continued. She placed them down on the ground in a line, the odd tower-shaped amulet lying above the distorted ankh. "This pattern corresponds to the unique indentation in the dais the Stargate lies upon."

"We think these amulets belong in that indentation on the dais." Quinn finished, glancing between O'Neill and Carter.

The four stared at the two amulets lying in on the ground in front of them. "You think these could be some kind of DHD master control crystal?" Jacob demanded.

Carter's eyes widened. "If that's true, that dais isn't a dais at all. It's a DHD!"

Quinn was nodding enthusiastically. "Some of the geometric glyphs in the circular indentations do correspond to matching glyphs on the Stargate itself," he agreed.

O'Neill was staring at them. "That plinth thing? A DHD? How?!"

Jacob was frowning. "I've never heard of any DHD that looked like that thing and neither has Selmak"

"I concur." Teal'c's voice was quiet.

Carter opened her mouth, then paused and looked at Quinn. The Kelownan spread his hands. "Unless we can translate the glyphs, it's useless to us anyway," he admitted.

"Those geometric shapes didn't look like any buttons I've ever seen. How would you key in the co-ordinates even if you did translate the glyphs?" Jacob wasn't looking at all convinced.

O'Neill shook himself. "So really this changes nothing," he interrupted as both Carter and Quinn started to speak. "Unless we get the glyphs translated, the whole gate is useless to us. If we do get the gate translated we don't know how to use the dais as a DHD so we'll be manually dialling anyway."

Anise nodded. "That is correct." She agreed. "These crystals are also cracked. If they _are_ the master control crystal it is possible their damage is too great to use properly. In that case, we can attempt to connect the salvaged crystals to the master crystal. A much easier proposition than attempting to connect them directly to the Stargate itself. If the damage is not extensive then the Stargate already has the energy required to dial out and we will not need to concern ourselves with the salvaged crystals at all. We need to reinstall the master crystal. As soon as we know what co-ordinates to put in, we can depart."

"That's all, eh?" O'Neill said dryly.

Anise stared at him for several moments, her expression irritated. She said nothing however. This time even she knew it wasn't as simple as it sounded. She was the most experienced archaeologist in the chamber and had been on the planet longer than anyone else. In all that time, she had learned nothing that would help her translate the glyphs on the Stargate and even though it now seemed the dais on which the gate rested could be the missing DHD, it was nothing she had ever come across before. She was baffled as to how this unique Stargate could possibly function and for once in her life was too full of doubt to retaliate in the face of the Colonel's continued hostility towards her.

Looking around, she could see no answers in anyone's faces but she felt no pleasure in finally seeing SG-1 as confused as she. The situation was too serious for that. With a sigh, she leaned down and retrieved the two crystal amulets. All her instincts told her they were missing something. She just couldn't, for the life of her, see what that something was.


	14. Rain Pours

**__**

Author's Note:

To answer some questions that have been asked: The Shambhala Gate can accept in-coming wormholes but SG-1 and the Tok'ra don't know how to create an out-going wormhole. Using a Stargate to arrive at a planet is only useful if you can either use it to get back home or have another method of getting off the planet. That is the dilemma currently facing those trapped on Shambhala (think of the film, _Torment of Tantalus_ or_ Prisoners_ for examples of what I mean). Hope that clarifies.

Chapter 14

__

He wasn't sure when it was he first noticed it, that faint whisper of sound. For a moment, he thought it was the rustle of wind through leaves but a moment later discarded that notion - it didn't seem to fit. Then he found himself thinking of an ocean's wave, the gentle lap of water across a sandy beach as he dozed lightly in the sun. It was definitely hot, he could feel the fine hairs on his arm prickling as the heat beat down upon him, drying slowly until his body began to fight back with a trickle of sweat that carved a burning channel through his dehydrated skin.

He shifted, uncomfortable but unwilling to open his eyes to locate a cooler spot. It wasn't an ocean he could hear, he realised slowly. It was deeper, with more of a rasp. It was a noise he hadn't awoken to in years, the sound of the wind rippling across parched earth, the waves formed as different from ebbing water as a desert was from the sea. There was no ocean here, not for many miles. The only fresh water had to be mined like the mineral his friends and neighbours dug for so diligently.

It made him thirsty just thinking about it. Or rather, he corrected himself, it made him notice how dry his throat was, how dehydrated he had become. Why he was in such need of liquid was something he didn't know. He couldn't remember the last time he had anything to drink but his entire body felt shrivelled, as brittle as a long-dead autumn leaf.

As if responding to his need for water, his skin tingled as more sweat flowed. Instead of cooling him, it only seemed to accentuate how hot he felt, as if the beads of sweat on his skin soaked up the heat from the air and transferred it to him. He ran his tongue over his lips, expecting to find them cracked and sore. Sore they certainly were and he flinched in shock at the pain but they slid easily under his touch, laden with the taste of salt and the tang of something that wasn't sweat at all.

Blood.

He couldn't remember being in a fight but he was becoming increasingly aware of the pain now that flared into life as the liquid oozed along skin too sensitive for him to bear. He tried to raise a hand to test his lips with his fingers but he couldn't move a muscle, his body was a lead weight that refused to respond to his commands. Liquid filled his parched mouth suddenly and unprepared for it, he coughed, choking it back up. He was only partially successful in spitting the unwanted invasion out of his mouth, the rest pooled in the back of his throat, making it hard for him to breathe. He could hear the bubbles popping at the nape of his neck as he wheezed and fought for breath. Once more he detected the salty, bloody tang and now the noise that had first disturbed him had risen to a roar. Not the roar of the wind, not the desert storm he had been expecting but a choking miasma that made the air as thick as treacle. He struggled to focus on the world around him but he already knew what it was he would see, knew finally the horror he had been too afraid to confront.

He opened his eyes to watch the fire engulf the world and knew that world was him.

"Report, Doctor."

That voice, so quiet, so firm, tore through the torment in his mind and stilled his panic as if it had been commanded directly to cease and desist. He sucked in a deep breath and felt the flood of relief that surged through his body when he realised the gesture brought no pain, no suffocating liquid air. There was a light shining directly onto him - whether a bedside lamp or an overhead light, he didn't know. His relief had robbed him of strength and his body still felt weighed down by a fear he was slowly beginning to recognise.

The sound of something being wheeled across the room forced him to open his eyes, and he realised at last that he was in the infirmary, watching two people in white approach a large, stocky-looking individual who was standing next to a slimmer figure partially obscured from his view. Detail was denied him and he realised he would need to locate his glasses. Instead of looking, he let his eyes drift shut again. The four weren't paying attention to him and right now he was glad to be ignored.

Doctor Fraiser contemplated the worried expression on General Hammond's face as his gaze swept over the monitors she and MacKenzie had pushed across the room on his arrival and spoke first. "When Doctor Jackson was late for an appointment, I decided to go and find him. With Major Feretti's help, I finally located him in Jonas' lab in a state of acute disassociation. He's currently under sedation and being monitored by Doctor MacKenzie's team," she nodded in the direction of the monitoring booth, something none of them could actually see from where they were standing but which they all knew existed, then returned her gaze to the General.

Hammond scowled and looked expectantly at MacKenzie. The psychiatrist exchanged a look with Fraiser before squaring his shoulders. "With the exception of yourself and Doctor Fraiser, the person who has had the most contact with Doctor Jackson since his return, has been Major Feretti." He glanced at the Major who was fidgeting restlessly with something in his hands. Feretti nodded uneasily and glanced once in Jackson's direction but there was no movement from the bed. As far as he could tell, his troubled friend was out cold. "According to Major Feretti's own observations, Doctor Jackson has been displaying behavioural symptoms that include nightmares, sleeplessness, emotional detachment and avoidance. These aren't conclusive, of course, and haven't been medically diagnosed yet, but they _are_ consistent with someone who _may_ be suffering from acute stress disorder and, depending on how long this has been going on, possibly post-traumatic stress disorder," he paused for a moment, watching as Hammond's face settled into grim lines at that prognosis.

"How likely is it to develop into PTSD?" The General looked like a man bracing himself for a debriefing on an imminent Goa'uld invasion.

Fraiser gestured to the monitors. "Hi MRI and PET scans are clean so far but we're going to be monitoring him for signs of depression. I'd like to say we've caught this early enough, sir but..." she paused.

Hammond nodded. "There are no guarantees, I know, Doctor." He glanced in Jackson's direction. "I know you'll do your best."

"I don't get it," Feretti's protest was sudden and unexpected.

"What's that, son?" Hammond turned to him.

"What triggered it? He seemed fine when he returned... well, aside from not knowing who anyone was. " He looked between the two doctors. "We're not talking about a 'Nam vet or someone who's survived a traumatic experience. I thought that's how people got PTSD. There was nothing wrong with Daniel a week ago."

The petite CMO almost visibly seemed to yield the floor to MacKenzie but whatever the psychiatrist was about to say next was interrupted by Hammond, whose gaze had fallen on Feretti's still nervous fingers. "Major, what's that?"

"Sir?" Feretti started and looked down at the object he had been unconsciously worrying at for the duration they had waited in the infirmary. "Oh, it fell out of Daniel's hands when we found him in Jonas' lab." He handed it across to Hammond.

The General found himself studying a small, framed photograph of a large grey cityscape. The picture had clearly been taken from inside a room, looking through a window and from a great height but Hammond didn't recognise the city, in fact, it reminded him of no city on Earth.

"I think that's Kelowna's capital city, sir," Fraiser commented, catching a glimpse of it as Hammond studied it. "I remember Jonas saying it was the only personal item he managed to bring with him. It was taken from the briefing room of the High Minister, apparently the room with the best view in the entire city." She gazed at it for a moment. "He said he brought it with him to remember that a complete stranger had been willing to do more to protect Kelowna than his own government."

"Do you mind?" MacKenzie extended a hand and Hammond obligingly handed it over to him. The psychiatrist studied it, frowning thoughtfully.

"What is it, Doctor?"

"Just a sudden thought, sir," he continued to contemplate the picture. "When SG-1 met with the Kelownan government, I take it this is the room they talked in?"

"I believe so." Hammond looked slightly bemused by the question, as if he was trying to analyse why the question might be relevant.

"So it's possible... even likely... that SG-1 would have seen this view for themselves?"

"I don't know, Doctor. I would assume so. What's this all about?"

MacKenzie turned to Fraiser. "This could be the missing link," he told her.

"I agree," she replied immediately.

"Doctors?"

At the hint of impatience creeping into the General's voice, both doctors turned back to him.

"If you two would care to follow me, I think there's something you should both see," Fraiser headed into her office and switched on the monitors. As the three found themselves places to stand that weren't in her way, she pulled a tape off the video player and slipped it into the machine. Turning it on, she picked up the remote and quickly sped through the footage until she hit the stop button. Then she turned back to them, her gaze resting on Feretti. "Do you remember what Daniel said when we were trying to restrain him in Jonas' lab?"

The Major frowned, casting his mind back, trying to recall what it was the distressed archaeologist had been shouting. He remembered being on the phone and that Daniel's words had made no sense at the time. "Something about off-world allies.." he paused. "Yeah, he said something about we don't go to offworld allies every time we get into trouble. It didn't make much sense."

"It didn't make much sense to me either," Fraiser agreed. "Not until Doctor MacKenzie and I went through the monitoring tapes we took while Daniel was dying. Watch this." she turned back to the monitors and hit the play button then stepped back to let them see what was on the screen.

__

Dressed only in white surgical scrubs, Daniel Jackson sits uncomfortably on a bed, his heavily bandaged hands resting gently in his lap. Confronting him, sits Jack O'Neill, lounging casually against a monitor next to the bed. At first glance, it seems like just another conversation, one more team leader checking up on his man's condition in the infirmary as if they have all the time in the world. But with cruel, impersonal honesty, the camera caresses the lines of strain in Jackson's face and the tension knotting the muscles in the Colonel's shoulders.

Discomfort crosses Jackson's features as he visibly forces himself to face O'Neill. A moment later his head bows again. Unable to maintain eye contact, his gaze shifts around the room - his lap, O'Neill's hands, the floor, the walls, the ceiling - everywhere, in fact, except back at the Colonel's face. "The nausea will be followed by tremors, convulsions and something called ataxia." Swallowing thickly, his gaze again slides away from O'Neill, gazing off into space, glazing over as he speaks, as if quoting from a textbook. "Surface tissue, brain tissue and internal organs will inflame and degrade. I believe that's called..." he flinches as if the word itself causes him pain to speak it. "...necrosis."

He stops talking and the silence in the room is as oppressive as the ancient air of a long-buried Egyptian tomb. Then the moment is broken as he begins to speak, bravely struggling to finish explaining his condition. "Based on the dose of radiation I got, that will happen in the next 10-15 hours." He sucks in a deep breath, visibly bracing himself for what he has to say next then rushes on as if afraid his courage will fail before he can finish saying what needs to be said. "And if I don't drown in my own blood and fluids first, I will bleed to death..." suddenly his eyes lock onto O'Neill's, refusing to look away. "...and there is no medical treatment to prevent that." He tries to chuckle, to smile, but it comes out as a faint huff and a forced grimace. Almost shyly, he looks down at his lap again, as if somehow embarrassed by the long speech he has just made.

Obviously stunned, O'Neill stares at him. He makes no attempt to smile back, it's clear he finds nothing amusing about this situation at all. His lips move soundlessly as he struggles to find words that can have any meaning after the news he's just received. After a silent struggle, he speaks, the casual tone so forced it's almost painful to listen to. "Maybe not that we know of..."

Jackson's gaze drops back to his bound hands. Absently, his fingers, the only parts of his skin visible through the bandages, toy with each other, a visible sign of nervousness. When he speaks, however, his voice his steady, even calm. "Jack, we don't go running to our offworld allies every time an individual's life's at stake." O'Neill raises his hand, trying to interrupt but Jackson's gaze is suddenly fixed on him, the conviction seared into his features forcing the Colonel to hold his peace. "It's no good telling me this is any different because my life is no more valuable than anybody else's."

The screen froze, monitor locked on the two men as they stared each other in the eye, stubborn denial in O'Neill's face and implacable determination on Jackson's. No-one in the room spoke, the spell that had bound the entire SGC the day Jackson died as powerful now as it had been then, a year ago. Slowly Feretti drew in a shuddering breath, the first to break the long silence but nevertheless unable to tear his gaze from the screen and the distress in the expressions of both men that had been captured forever in time. "That's what he said in Jonas' lab. He quoted that exactly."

Hammond drew himself up to his full height, visibly pulling himself together and turned to look at the CMO. "What's the significance, Doctor?"

"He's suffering from flashbacks, sir," MacKenzie's quiet voice responded instead. "It's something we look for when diagnosing PTSD."

"Flashbacks?" the horror that flooded Hammond's gaze was too powerful to hide and he didn't even try. "You mean...?"

"Yes, General," Fraiser said softly. "He's reliving the radiation sickness. As vividly as the day he died."


	15. Loyalty

****

Author's Note:

It's been a long time since I've written fanfiction. Real Life and a writer's block does that to you. Hopefully though, writer's block has been consigned to oblivion. Yay.

* * *

Chapter 15

In this world below ground, there was nothing. Without light, the tunnels and rooms were not plunged into darkness, they dwelt within a void, a void where nothing lived and existence was only a dream. Without light, senses were almost deprived. Eyesight was useless, hearing dedicated only the sounds of the body to which the ears were attached, touch could not feel even air - for in this place the wind did not blow. As if breath itself had been banished, this was a realm that belonged to the dead. There was nothing here, except death. It lingered in air like an echo and clung to unseen walls like footsteps long fossilised in time.

With each soft footfall, Teal'c moved slowly through this alien world like a hunting cat. He could have made the job much easier on himself had he only turned on his flashlight but he had long since given up on light. After days on this planet, hiding in this subterranean world from the Jaffa patrols above, he had only now come to understand this fact. The Tok'ra had explored this world with their artificial light sources, and the humans he called allies had later done the same.

As they explored the tunnels and ancient rooms, he had felt as though they were missing something, something important, as if all he had to do was extend one finger in the right direction and he would be allowed to touch that thing he could not see and understand everything that was unknown. As he had watched the lights chase the shadows away from the walls, he had finally realised the truth. Once he had switched off his flashlight, he had felt himself be guided by instincts honed long ago in battle and sensations that were indefinable even to his experience and wisdom. Without light, his skin brushed through the cobwebs of time and tingled as it faced the whispers of the past. For here, no longer obscured by the blinding light, the walls whispered their secrets to those who were willing to listen.

He was not alone.

There had been no sound, no sudden movements in the still air, no different scent to waft away the staleness of an unchanging world, only sharpened senses and experience to tell his conscious mind what his heart knew.

He was not alone.

He eased himself at right angles, painstakingly feeling his way until his sensitive fingers brushed a wall. Carvings embedded into the surface prickled his skin, but he had no time to wonder what they represented. He sank slowly to ground, in a ready crouch, easing his grip along his thigh until his fingers curled reassuring around the handle of his zat. With the same measured calm, he laid his staff on the ground, and pulled free the smaller weapon. Instinct could whisper its own secrets, and he knew without knowing that his staff weapon would not serve him well in this situation.

A sharp stab of pain in his eyes disoriented him and his arm had lifted to protect them from the attack before his mind had registered the pain came from the sudden appearance of light. He could not see its source; it was just out of sight, behind a door that led into the room he was in.

He glanced around quickly, assessing his location. There was no place to hide - it was a small antechamber of some kind and he was already near another set of doors. He turned his attention back to where the light was coming aware now that there were voices from beyond, the voices of Tok'ra speaking in Goa'uld.

"You have concerns?" It was a woman's voice, Ilithya.

"You do not?" Sin replied. "Our supplies are limited, the Jaffa close in on us every day. We must leave this place."

"This is the safest place within access of the Stargate," Anise argued. "We have not explored further into the mountains. We do not know if there is anywhere to hide or whether Jaffa are already there. It takes us further away from the Stargate and any hope we have of leaving this world."

"This place will not be safe much longer and if the Tau'ri go ahead with their plan to return to the Stargate to study the glyphs, we will be discovered immediately. The Tau'ri are reckless as you well know. Colonel O'Neill and his team are among the worst examples of this."

"We have no other choice. We have exhausted our resources in this place. We have to return to the gate."

"You support the Tau'ri in this, Anise?" Ilithya seemed rather sceptical.

There was a pause for a moment, then Anise sighed reluctantly. "They have proven to be... inventive in the past."

"Inventiveness will avail us nothing if we are seen." Sin responded irritably. "The route to the Stargate contains little cover. The Tau'ri were fortunate they were not spotted the first time they made the journey and the location of the Stargate itself is extremely exposed."

"But you would propose we leave this place for a destination unknown to us into territory that remains unexplored? Is that not also reckless?"

"It is not ideal but we have few choices. We will be discovered. The Jaffa are now patrolling this area frequently. If we delay we will be trapped here - we will neither be able to leave for new territory nor travel to the Stargate."

"Ilithya, are you with Sin on this?"

"I do not like the options but I agree we have run out of time in which to find a better alternative."

"What does Selmak say on this matter?"

There was another pause. "We have not addressed this with him."

"Why not?"

"You know the concerns of the High Council, Anise. Allowing Selmak to be placed in the body of a Tau'ri has had consequences unforeseen by us at the time. The host has gained an uncomfortable degree of influence over Selmak's decisions. He allows himself to be too easily swayed by the Tau'ri."

"You assume Selmak will automatically side with the Tau'ri on this matter? Do you know this for certain?" Anise did not wait for a response. "If you truly feel this is the only path we must take to survive, we will have to make this known to the Tau'ri anyway. Your concerns regarding Selmak are therefore irrelevant at this moment in time. What will you recommend if the Tau'ri disagree with your assessment?"

"That we part ways," Sin said bluntly. "We can wait no longer nor can we afford to be captured by Anubis. If the Tau'ri will not come with us, we will travel alone."

Teal'c didn't move from his spot until long after the Tok'ra were gone and his eyes had readjusted to the soulless darkness once again. Eventually, he rose to his feet, putting away his zat and reclaiming his staff, then began to move back to the throne room.

That the Tok'ra were concerned about remaining here was no surprise to him. He shared those concerns and suspected that O'Neill had them as well. What unsettled him was the knowledge that the Tok'ra had lost trust in Selmak, one of their own, for his connections to the Tau'ri.

There had been little choice when General Jacob Carter had become the host to Selmak. Both host and symbiote would have died if they had not united, and the unity had cemented an alliance between the Tok'ra and Tau'ri that had lasted to the present time - both sides had agreed to make Selmak the liaison between their peoples and, until now, Teal'c had assumed this liaison was not a matter for concern.

Apparently, his assumption had been flawed. The Tok'ra had wanted one of their own to represent their interests to the Tau'ri without compromising their needs and desires in return. The Tau'ri had not conformed to that plan and much of the strain in the relationship came from the belief of the Tau'ri that the Tok'ra wanted a one-way relationship rather than a true partnership. Selmak had been one of the few Tok'ra to sympathise with this and it now seemed his sympathy was labelling him a traitor amongst his own people.

Shol'va.

Until Teal'c had joined the Tau'ri in the fight against the Goa'uld, the only way he had possessed to fight their evil had been a path of moderation. As First Prime of Apophis, he had found the power to ease the demands of his God, and deflect the worst of his wrath from humans and Jaffa alike. That path had never been enough for Teal'c but he had never seen any culture capable of resisting in a more direct way. Not until the day that Apophis had travelled to two planets on the distant frontiers of Ra's territory to claim a host for his queen. When he had chosen the host for Apophis, he - and the System Lords themselves - had no way of knowing just how far reaching the consequences of that act would be, or of how they would ripple throughout the entire galaxy like an unchecked tsunami.

He stands, in the centre of a room lit only by natural light and firebrands, surrounded by a village of people who have come to witness his fate, the accusations of crimes from a past that has finally caught up with him.

But he is not the one all eyes are upon right now, for everyone is watching the two men standing before the crowd, discussing his past crimes, revealing to the entire village the story of how he had come to be fighting with humans instead of with Goa'uld.

"The fact is, you work side by side with the man responsible for your wife's fate."

"It was difficult for me at first. I wanted to hate him. But now I know it was a different Teal'c that chose Sha're. And I know that if there were any way for him to help me get my wife back this Teal'c would do it gladly. Even if it meant giving up his own life."

He swallows thickly, as caught up in the emotion as anyone else in the room and the silence that follows the realisation that he can do a man so much wrong and yet witness that same man fight with everything he possesses to save his life instead of condemn it.

Why?

Light split apart the gloom, shattering the darkness into a thousand tendrils that snaked their way back into the corners that the sun could not reach. Teal'c watched the great painted disk on the wall flare into life, a burning red-hot sun that dominated the throne room, with an unflinching gaze staring down symbolism he had once not had the courage to raise his eyes to, let alone openly defy.

_He walks into the tent, beholding the sight he had feared but had hoped he would not see - his team-mate, his friend, driven to his knees by the power of the Goa'uld hand device, powerless to do anything but die. All he has to do, _all_ he has to do is raise his staff, pull the trigger and the Goa'uld killing Daniel Jackson will be dead._

_But he finds himself frozen by indecision, unable to act, for the Goa'uld killing Jackson is Amonet, the mate of Apophis. To save the life of Daniel Jackson he must kill Amonet but the only way to do that is to kill Amonet's innocent host. Sha're._

_He is already responsible for taking the mind and body of Sha're from Daniel Jackson. Can he take her life as well?_

_There's a clatter as the gun tumbles from Jackson's hand, hitting the ground with a pathetic tinkle. His shoulders are sagging and Teal'c knows he's run out of time. Amonet turns to confront him and the time of choice is over. His staff weapon flares into life almost of its own accord and the Goa'uld crumples to the ground, dead._

_It takes Sha're only moments longer to die and Daniel Jackson watches it all._

_He can barely believe what he has done, the choice he has been forced to make that was no true choice at all. "I am sorry, Daniel Jackson." He does not ask for forgiveness, how can there be any Tau'ri ritual where a murderer can ask a husband to forgive him for the death of his wife?_

_"You did the right thing, Teal'c," Jackson whispers._

_The rest of SG-1 enter the tent and take in the sight and turn to him for explanation. "Daniel Jackson will be fine," he informs the Colonel softly, and, as he watches the archaeologist turn back to his wife in grief - but not in anger - he knows it's absolutely true. He does not understand - but he accepts._

Before he had met SG-1, loyalty had held two meanings to him. The first was that of unquestioning obedience to one's God; the second was something different, more personal, but which could be summed up in one word.

Bra'tac.

Father, mentor, blood brother; the former First Prime's battle prowess was without doubt and his wisdom without question. He had raised Teal'c after the death of Teal'c's own father; he had trained Teal'c in the ways of the warrior but also in the less honourable - but equally necessary - art of politics and then given him the wisdom to know when to obey a false god and when to oppose him. And when Teal'c had turned his back on Apophis, Chulak and his own family in order to continue the fight, Bra'tac had been there to care for his wife and son as he could not.

There was nothing he would not do for Bra'tac.

However, the loyalty between himself and Bra'tac had never been tested. Neither of them had been forced to make decisions or perform actions that would threaten the faith they had in the other. Loyalty was therefore something Teal'c had thought he understood before meeting the Tau'ri but only later come to realise he had barely scratched the surface of.

The true depth of loyalty had become clear to him after he had joined SG-1; where he had witnessed first hand the events that shook the faith they had in each other to the core, events that had forced them to make decisions with terrible consequences for those who trusted them, or had seen them actively turn on each other. Each time, they had found a path out of the ashes, and emerged from each trial stronger than ever.

That was the lesson Teal'c had learned - that loyalty wasn't faithfulness to one who had done right by you. It was faithfulness to one who had done you wrong and repented. It was the trust that came after betrayal. The ability to forgive.

For all their advanced technology, their experience fighting the Goa'uld and their dedication to each other and their cause, Teal'c suspected that true loyalty was not something Tok'ra fully understood. In that, they were like the Goa'uld they shared a nature with: they rewarded alliance and obedience but punished dissent and defiance swiftly. It was very rare they could see beyond defiance or betrayal and forgive.

Teal'c wondered if that was a lesson Selmak had learned off the Tau'ri just as he had done, if that was what set this ancient Tok'ra apart from the rest of his kind and why the High Council now found it so hard to relate to him.

"Thinking deep thoughts?"

Teal'c's gaze slid to his periphery and found Quinn at his side, gazing at the pictures on the wall as intently as he had been a moment before. He glanced around the room only now realising they were alone.

"The Tok'ra no longer trust Selmak," he responded bluntly.

Quinn stared at him for a moment. "You sure?"

"I am sure, Jonas Quinn."

"Well... why not?"

"His trust for the Tau'ri is too great. They are uncomfortable with that."

"Oh. Yeah." Quinn was silent for a moment. "Seems to be going around."

Teal'c glanced at him again, remembering that Jonas Quinn was in exile from his own world for having sided with the Tau'ri when Daniel Jackson had been fatally exposed to radiation while there.

"Do you understand the nature of loyalty, Jonas Quinn?"

Quinn blinked and eyed him, as if wondering where on earth that question had come from. "Uh... yeah... I hope so."

"I thought I did. Until I met the Tau'ri. Then I learned I only understood half a truth."

Quinn squinted at him for a moment then turned back to stare at the sun disk. He seemed to be thinking, and then he finally nodded, slowly. "It's funny - back on Kelowna I was an advisor on the ethical use of science to some of my country's most powerful people. But when I think about it, what they were really interested in when they used the word "ethical", was in finding ways to justify moral ambiguity that didn't make them look too bad to the public. Earth uses ethics for the same game but some of them are willing to stand up to it. How to take a stand is what I learned off you guys. Especially Dr Jackson."

"Daniel Jackson is very good at... taking a stand."

"Hey! You can't leave me here like this!"

"I haven't left your side, Teal'c. And I'm not going to."

Teal'c stared at the sun disk, disturbed by the sudden realisation that perhaps they were not as good at taking a stand as Quinn thought they were. They were trapped on this alien world, standing on the edge of a chasm that would drag them all in the moment the Tau'ri and the Tok'ra began arguing over what course of action they should take next, when they should have been back at the SGC standing beside Daniel Jackson with the same determination he had displayed for them in the past.

When he had lost his mind, had thought he was going to die and could not distinguish reality from dream, Daniel Jackson had defied the rules and orders of beings so powerful Teal'c could barely comprehend their nature, to stand by the Jaffa in his time of need. Now he had left his team-mate, his friend, in the SGC, in a similar state of mental confusion, because he had chose to follow orders instead of taking a stand.

Did he understand loyalty as well as he had just claimed or was he lying to himself, cowering behind a cloak of blankets to shield himself from the painful truth like a child that needed protection?

"I guess this is where it all began," Quinn was musing, following his own train of philosophical thought. "For Earth. Standing in front of the symbol of Ra and deciding to take a stand."

Strip away the illusion to find the reality... Teal'c blinked, staring at the disk and wondered why he had not seen it sooner.

"You are correct, Jonas Quinn, in that the Tau'ri were confronted with the symbol of Ra before their fight began. This, however," he added darkly, staring at the sun disk on the wall. "Is not the symbol of Ra. And we have been fools to think that it was."


	16. In the Hall of Ma'at

**Chapter 16**

Feretti had once thought labs were quiet places - full of whirring equipment, hushed voices, the scratching of chalk on a blackboard. It had been part of the stereotype of the scientific world he had shared with thousands of other people. Scientists were meek; they were mild. They stammered a lot when they did speak and generally didn't communicate enthusiastically with outsiders.

What Feretti hadn't truly appreciated until joining the Stargate Programme, was how passion ran like an explosive undercurrent through the scientific world, like a dodgy fuse just waiting to blow at the tiniest spark. He had walked into the archaeology labs with the intention of sticking his nose into the research being conducted on P5-2M7, only to find the archaeologists gathered around a scaled down, but accurately detailed, holographic representation of the Shambhala gate, were arguing.

Again.

He had been about to wade in, wearing his exasperation like an open sore; to remind them he had made threats that he _would_ see carried out this time. Instead, he had taken a moment to pause, the soldier within him insisting it needed a chance to scout the lay of the land before engaging the enemy - and that hesitation had revealed the situation was not the same has it had been previously.

Certainly Iris and Aja were taking it in turns to address Moore, the cold aloofness of the symbiote contrasting with the heated tempers of both the host and the human team leader but the other humans didn't seem to be entirely on Moore's side. Certainly some of them clearly were - but some of them seemed to be agreeing with the Tok'ra, and, intrigued, Feretti had begun to actually listen.

An hour later, he had to admit he didn't understand the argument at all. It seemed to centre on how ancient Egyptians had used food rituals and that there was absolutely no way the Stargate on P5-2M7 could be a focal point of divine culinary offerings. Apparently, Moore and his supporters were considering the possibility the bowl-shaped pits in the dais of the Shambhala gate were designed to hold votive offerings, and certainly even Feretti could remember going to planets where Stargates had been a central focus for leaving food offerings for the Gods. The Tok'ra and her supporters, however, were convinced the bowls were not food-holding receptacles but were designed to hold something else... and no, not drink either, Aja had insisted emphatically.

Absolutely everyone had seemed to agree the pitted dais had some kind of important ritual significance but nobody seemed to notice they were mostly agreeing - they seemed far too distracted by the ritual importance of food to Egyptian gods and, by extension, Goa'uld.

It just didn't seem all that important to Feretti. He turned away with a sigh, and hesitated, momentarily frozen by consternation as he watched Daniel Jackson march through the doors into the lab, with all the apparent focus of a man with a mission.

"Hey, Daniel, wait up!" Feretti hurried after him, leaping at any opportunity to leave the bickering scientists to their own pursuits. Several archaeologists turned at the Major's call, but the two primary antagonists didn't falter.

"You've been discharged from the infirmary?" he asked, watching Jackson crane his head upwards, scanning some high shelves with a frown as if looking for something.

"Mackenzie released me," was the clipped response.

"You're better then?" Feretti pushed a little cautiously, Jackson's mood didn't seem to be too good and the Major wasn't entirely convinced it was possible Jackson could have recovered from his collapse so quickly. PTSD, the CMO and chief psychiatrist had said, and Feretti knew enough veterans to know people didn't recover from PTSD overnight. In fact, he had never heard of anyone who had recovered from PTSD at all.

Jackson froze for a moment, then turned a piercing blue stare on him. Feretti struggled to maintain a calm expression. He knew that look, he remembered it from times past, situations where the archaeologist had been confronting people he knew did not like him or unfairly considered him to be a threat. It was a look that promised war.

"I'm fine," he stated flatly, then turned and began to move along the shelves, still craning his head upwards, still clearly looking... for something.

He noticed the Major wince at his tone but, for the moment, he didn't care. He was upset, he was angry, he was...

He wasn't sure.

Lying in the infirmary had been a nightmare. Every time he had closed his eyes, he could see a vision of pain mapped across his inner eyelids, etched in a fire of burst blood vessels and skin that melted over his face like molten plastic. Twice, he had found himself unable to keep the contents of his stomach to himself, each time triggered upon waking up to the salty, ferrous tang of blood in the back of his throat. Blood his conscious mind tried so desperately to point out did not exist, but which his dreams told him _once had_.

The second time, he had refocused on the room around him, to find his peripheral vision clouded by a waterfall of white. Panic had claimed his mind then, panic he didn't fully understand... the sensation of being closed in, four walls moving inexorably closer, a ceiling that shrank towards the ground... or was that a floor that rose towards the ceiling? He didn't know.

He did know he wasn't able to breathe, that he was trapped in a room with no windows and a door that would not be willingly exposed to him. He was trapped in a vision of Hell, and Hell, for a reason he did not understand, was a vision in white.

_Doctor Jackson?_

He had scrambled back instinctively, before being able to focus on the source of his fear, and found Mackenzie standing next to him, wearing his lab coat, looking at him with a sympathetic expression on his face. A sympathy that made frustration explode in his breast like a time bomb, an eruption that left him breathless and bemused.

_Stop. One second..._

He was afraid of this man... and he was angry with this man. But bizarrely, he didn't know why.

Mackenzie had handed him a glass of water, and Jackson took it hesitantly, staring at the clear depths as if he wasn't entirely certain what the water was for.

_Look, Daniel, it's time for your meds._

He swallowed, suddenly not feeling very thirsty at all, and placed the water on the table next to the bed. Mackenzie had begun to explain to him about the concept of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder and suggested he should arrange for regular counselling as soon as possible. It was all about learning to cope, recognising the triggers, and handling the aftermath. Taking it one step at a time, one day at a time. Knowing when to push, and when to rest.

_I think I've rested enough._

He'd echoed the sentiment out loud and the psychiatrist had given him an odd look but agreed there was no reason to keep him in the infirmary while he was confined to base, and as long as he agreed to the counselling.

_"I'm sorry."_

_"For what?"_

_"For being such a headcase."_

It wasn't a compromise Jackson was happy with but if it got him out of the infirmary, away from his unsettling mistrust of the psychiatrist in charge of his mental health, away from a room that somehow seemed as scarred as his own memories by the pain he felt inside, he was willing to accept it.

If he had been expecting to find peace away from the infirmary, he quickly found himself denied it. Heading directly for his quarters, he had barricaded the door behind him, and returned to his diaries, reading them with the hunger of a starving man, searching for...

He was searching for something, of that he was certain. What that something was, he didn't know. Answers lingered in the shadows just beyond sight, in the periphery of his dreams rather than in the dreams themselves, in the blurred aftermath of his visions but stubbornly refusing to find focus during the actual flashbacks.

_Isolated, in the middle of nowhere, they are supposed to be allies, but as he looks at the man who is with him, the man who commands him, he feels no respect, no support, and sees none returned._

_"Well, I think you might be losing what's left of your mind."_

_"What's that supposed to mean?!"_

_"It means that on a good day, you can be a little flaky!"_

_Somehow, he's always known he didn't receive the respect he deserved. Now, he has proof._

Restlessly, he had thrown the diaries onto his bed and risen, pacing the length of the small space, unable to concentrate, unable to find a release for his anxieties. He wasn't sure what was the most frustrating: the uncomfortable detail to which he was subjected to during the flashbacks and the dreams, or his inability to place the memories into any kind of context, to find some kind of order, something that would allow them to make sense. At the moment, what he could actually remember was a jumbled mess, without structure of any kind. It was as if he was confronted by a box full of papers torn from a book and it was up to him sort them out into their correct order. Without any page numbers to help guide him, he had to read each individual page at a time.

And so far, it made for very unpleasant reading.

_"You're gonna wear a hole in the floor."_

He froze in the middle of his room staring at the bedside table, his gaze fixed on the picture of the dark-haired beauty who had once been his wife but whom he could still barely remember.

_"I can't get her out of my head, Sam. I think I made a big mistake."_

_Another time, another place and he's still pacing. Still overcome by a restless frustration he cannot express. But there's more, there's a powerful yearning, an overwhelming desire, a... a..._ need _he cannot resist, can no longer deny._

_"You're not serious."_

_"I am."_

_It baffles him that she, who claims to be his friend, can fail so completely to understand him. The truth is obvious to him; she must be as blind as a bat to not realise that. Although, she never was as clever as she thought she was. Remember the beginning? The first days of the new Stargate Programme? She tried to solve the riddle of the gate for over two years and got nowhere. He has solved the riddle in a mere two weeks, and the answers lay in a science that was her area of expertise, not his._

_How dumb can some people be?_

_"You _have _a wife!"_

_"Had. Had a wife." She still doesn't get it. He decides to explain it in small words, so she can follow. "Come on, seriously. How long am I supposed to wait? And if I find Sha're one day... what are the chances she's ever going to be the same again?"_

_Her continued confusion answers his question. Apparently, some people really _can _be that dumb._

He picked up the photograph, staring at it silently, his eyes searching the smallest details of her face. Her skin didn't have the smooth, pampered complexion of a woman used to heated indoors, temperate climates and health spa holidays. She had lived in the desert her entire life; she had walked for long miles in the searing heat of the coolest parts of the day and had been forced to dig for water while men mined the earth. Her skin, while it glowed with health and vitality, nevertheless whispered stories of that life for anyone who was willing to pay attention.

_"So, Doctor Jackson. Tell me more about Sha're. How did you meet?"_

He thought he had been one such listener. He had, after all, married her. The grief he felt when he remembered her death in his dreams was very real... or... he thought it had been. Now, now he wasn't so sure.

_They're walking through an open forest. Mist hangs in the air, and their breath steams in the chilly, early morning light. He is momentarily taken aback by the question._

_"Sha're... well, she's... uh..." how on earth does he explain this?_

_"She was a gift." Colonel O'Neill sounds amused as he strides on ahead. Apparently, he has no such difficulty defining the problem._

_"She was actually." At this point, there's no point beating around the bush. After all, the Colonel is quite right. "From the elders of Abydos, the first time we were there."_

_"And you accepted?!"_

Jackson sat down on the edge of the bed, not completely certain what he was feeling. What was this? An arranged marriage? In his memories, the men did not seem as bothered as the women... the woman. Major Carter. She was absolutely horrified. His wife. Property. Chattel.

Had he accepted because he believed that was how women should be treated? Was the grief over her death something he thought should be appropriate rather than something he had really felt? Certainly, he had not been faithful during the marriage, he had not waited for her when she had been taken. He had moved on quickly, his memories told him that.

Clearly, he was not the kind of man who treated women as equals. What else did that make him?

_"Where in the name of heaven did you come from!"_

_"Prison, actually. We just broke out."_

He pushed up his glasses and rubbed the bridge of his nose wearily, the detail slipping away yet again. His glasses fell back onto his nose with a painful bump and he gazed silently at the photograph for a few more moments.

_He kneels in the sand staring into a yawning abyss. He is in the desert, he can see the brightness of the sun all around him, and yet he feels no heat, nothing but a chill that numbs him deep within. People surround him and yet he feels alone. He has been alone for much of his life but this is the first time he has been unable to cope with the sensation, to hate this isolation with a bitter passion._

_His eyes lift and focus on a set of scales in front of him. They are old, worn, having seen many years and countless gatherings just such as this. On one side, he sees balanced a stone in the shape of a vase.. or something similar. On the other side... _

_... a feather._

Daniel dropped the photograph back onto the bedside table as if it had suddenly burned his fingers and strode out of the room. He didn't think about where he was going, or why. He just knew he had something to do, something to find. It didn't make sense, but nothing had made sense since SG-1 had found him on that lonely planet, paralysed by the void of his own mind.

Which was why he now found himself in the archaeology labs, standing on a chair and hunting through the highest shelves, digging through a mountain of Egyptian artefacts as Feretti looked on, the expression on the Major's face mirroring the confusion Jackson himself was feeling.

"Daniel," Feretti said slowly. "You need some help there?"

_You know, it is beyond my comprehension how anybody like yourself who has so much power, can miss the point entirely!_

Of course, what Feretti was really asking was whether Jackson should have been touching any of these artefacts in the first place. His fist curled around a small stone object reflexively as rage suddenly exploded through his body like a wall of water bursting through a broken dam.

_A man stands before him, questioning his actions, a man who calls him friend, and who thinks that friendship allows him to question Jackson's motives with blatant disregard. His hand rises, orange light bursting from the open palm, striking the disrespectful cur in the centre of the forehead. His victim crumbles towards the ground, writhing in agony and a sense of pure elation runs through Jackson's body at the sight. _

_No-one has the right to question him. No-one._

Jackson's eyes flew open to stare at his tightly clenched fist. Taking a deep, heavy breath, he forced his fingers to relax, to open, and to reveal the object he was clutching to so desperately. It was a small green stone, shaped like an urn, or a vase. He stared at it in silence, wondering what on earth he was supposed to do with it next.

"Daniel?" Feretti sounded worried now, and Jackson could feel his irritation building still further.. but something was lurking behind the rage, something that kept it in check, something that felt... almost like exhaustion?

Quickly, he pulled down the set of scales the stone vase had been resting on, and climbed off the chair, setting the equipment up on the table. As he stepped back from the table, he felt Feretti move up next to him, hovering at his shoulder.

"What is this?" the Major asked softly but Jackson didn't answer. He glanced sideways at his companion but the archaeologist seemed a million miles away, staring through the scales instead of at them, his eyes incredibly blue as they looked into a world Feretti couldn't see. "Daniel?" he raised his voice slightly.

_At first, there is only darkness, then suddenly light erupts in his eyes. His gaze focuses on the small petite form of his doctor, her brown eyes gentle, worried and professional, all at the same time. He isn't fooled, however, and he has prepared for her coming._

_Before she can comprehend what is happening, he knocks her flying, and he is freeing himself from his restraints. Up, out of the bed, he punches the guard escorting her and the man crumples to the ground. Enraged that they had dared restrain him at all, he bends over the man and keeps punching. The man does not get up, but he has no intention of stopping. The release feels good, the pain he is inflicting... feels good._

Jackson's gaze refocused on the scales and he held out green stone in his hands for Feretti to look at. "Heart scarab," he murmured. "Egyptians believed that upon death, every soul had to weigh his heart against a feather. If there was balance, he would enter the afterlife..." he trailed off.

Feretti stared at the vase-shaped stone. It didn't really look like a heart to him, and he couldn't wrap his head around the simple physics of the situation. A stone? Versus a feather? "What happened if the heart was too heavy?" he asked curiously.

"The Egyptians believed the deceased entered oblivion."

"Oh," Feretti wasn't really certain what to say to that. A vague memory nudged at his conscious mind then, a recollection of a set of scales similar to this at Sha're's funeral, Jackson kneeling over it. He looked at his friend, who was staring at the scarab in his hands with an intense gaze.

"What do you believe?" he asked curiously.

_"We let her out.."_

_"... the Destroyer of Worlds."_

Jackson didn't answer for several moments. He remembered wondering why he was here, why his memory had been lost - that if it was true he had ascended to heaven, why then had he descended? He had wondered if he even had the right to speculate on the reasons for his fate.

Now, at last, he knew.

"Daniel?"

Jackson glanced at him with a steady blue gaze, the emotions lurking within their clear depths too veiled for Feretti to read. "I believe," he said very quietly, "that it's a theory I don't want to test."

And, ignoring the Major's open stare, he put the scales away.


	17. Laughter of the Gods

**Chapter 17**

Lost in thought, Jonas Quinn stood in the centre of the room, at the foot of the nine steps that led up to the great golden throne. He should have been listening to Teal'c but he already knew what the Jaffa was planning to say. His brow furrowed as he studied the relief carved into the wall behind the throne, his fingers nervously shuffling his notebooks.

He hadn't been planning to make extensive translations when he had embarked on this mission to P5-2M7. It was supposed to have been a simple investigation - travel to an abandoned planet and find out what had happened to the Tok'ra science team assigned to study the planet's ruins. Ruins that had not been associated with Ancient Egypt. However, in the year he had spent on Earth, he had learned nothing was ever as simple as it first seemed. He had learned to take his notebooks - Doctor Jackson's notebooks - with him every time he stepped through a Stargate.

Still, he didn't have the kind of resources he really needed for the extensive translation required to resolve their current problems. What he did have was his prodigious memory and it was to that memory, instead of to Teal'c, he was now listening.

"What's up, T?" O'Neill asked as everyone gathered in front of the throne. The Colonel was looking a little harried although Quinn was hardly surprised - the man had been on the move since they had arrived, ensuring they remained beyond the awareness of the Jaffa patrols, scouting the underground terrain and setting up booby-traps for if the Jaffa did actually find them. Considering the stress he was under, he was in remarkable good humour... for Colonel O'Neill.

"O'Neill, that is not the symbol of Ra," Teal'c informed him gravely, gesturing to the huge sun disk that Quinn was already staring at.

"It's not?" O'Neill turned to study it, suspicion etched across his face. "Sure looks like it to me."

"Feathers were not a symbol associated with Ra," Teal'c told him coolly. "Yet they are much in evidence within this chamber."

"So are snakes, Teal'c," O'Neill pointed out dryly. "But apparently that's not enough to prove these digs ever belonged to Apophis."

"Ra was not the only Goa'uld to use the symbol of the sun," Teal'c forged on patiently. "Isis also used that symbol."

O'Neill stared at him, then glanced back at the huge sun disk on the wall. He turned back to Teal'c. "Isis as in wife-of-Osiris-Isis?"

"Indeed."

The Colonel turned to give the Tok'ra a long stare. "Isn't this your area? How come you didn't get this?" he demanded.

All four Tok'ra were frowning and exchanging puzzled looks. "What brings you to this conclusion, Teal'c?" Anise asked him. "We have never heard of Isis adopting the ceremonies of Ra. The Goa'uld have forever been protective of the symbolism they have chosen to use. To steal the symbol of Ra would be akin to stealing his very identity. There is a reason the System Lords have mocked Osiris for adopting the body of a woman. The maleness of his former hosts was part of the identity he chose to represent his power." She hesitated a moment before continuing. "I admit Isis was known for favouring the symbology of birds over that of other things but I have not heard of her adopting the symbols of the sun."

The Jaffa stared at her. "It is something Daniel Jackson once told me," he clarified slowly. "When Osiris and Isis were discovered on the Tau'ri homeworld, and Osiris fled Earth, Daniel Jackson explained to me the known history of Osiris and his queen amongst the Tau'ri," he turned back to the wall. "There was a great struggle for power between Ra and Isis. Through guile and trickery, Isis proved the victor and adopted his symbols in his name to rule over the people. She became the sun that Ra had been, and gained a reputation for governing the power of life, when once she had only been known for having power over death."

"Such symbology was not presented before the System Lords," Ilithya commented thoughtfully. "The Tok'ra would have known if such was the case."

"Well, what was Isis to the System Lords... and to the Tok'ra?" Carter asked them curiously.

_"I read that book you gave me." Walking at a swift place through the corridors of the secret research facility they're navigating, he is not blind to the surprise that passes across his companion's features._

_"Already? I just gave it to you last night,"_

_"Quick study," he explains, a little sheepishly. "It's how I got this position at my age."_

Quinn dropped his eyes to his notes again. He knew the answer to that as well. Doctor Jackson had possessed a keen understanding of the subject matter and the extrapolations of Earth history he made in light of his understanding of Goa'uld behaviour and society had usually proven accurate. Rarely had his notes led Quinn astray since the Kelownan had replaced him as a member of SG-1.

He had brought nothing with him that would clarify the history of Isis and certainly nothing that would explain this complex satisfactorily. But he had read every thing Doctor Jackson had ever written and owned on the subject of the Goa'uld and Ancient Egypt and could recall the vast majority of it with little effort.

There had been a time when he had considered his photographic memory to be a gift but these days, since encountering first hand the experiments and consequences of Nirrti's quest for a Hok'tar, part of him no longer regarded it as a blessing. There were things he could remember that he wished he had never experienced, things he remembered in vivid detail that he was unable to forget.

_He's standing in a corridor, discussing medical reports with one of the facility's doctors. It's up to him to discuss the current status of the stricken scientists with the ruling council. It's not a job he is looking forward to. The council has not had to witness, as he has, the lingering deaths of these men. Once vital, intelligent men in the prime of their lives, slowly being reduced to a mess of blood and sores, before drowning to death as blood pools in their lungs... these men, his friends. He would not wish this fate on even a Tiranian or Andari. No-one deserves a death like this._

_And the council... which did not witness these deaths, which should have. What can he possibly say to them that will explain the horror he felt witnessing their deaths, the pointlessness of it all, the powerlessness he feels? Do they truly want victory over Tirania and Andari at this cost? He is the council's chief advisor on ethics of this project. He was born knowing the danger his people live in, the constant fear of being invaded and destroyed by his peoples' enemies but now, now he is beginning to see the cost of victory. Now, he is beginning to wonder if victory at any price is as justifiable as he has been raised from birth to believe._

Somewhere, at the back of his mind, he could hear the Tok'ra and the humans discussing Isis. Tuning them out, he began to flick through his notes. Right now, he wasn't certain what he was searching for but Teal'c had awoken something in him: an instinct; a memory - he wasn't sure what but he knew it was there, in the back of his mind like a restlessly growing seed.

_"Hey!"_

_He looks up and winces inside. It's the commander of the alien visitors, the ones who are responsible for Kelowna's current predicament. He has no words for the High Minister, what can he possibly offer this clearly irate alien?_

_"Colonel O'Neill," his voice is quiet. "I'm surprised to see you."_

_Colonel O'Neill, as Quinn has come to expect, doesn't beat around the bush. "I've brought a letter from my superiors to your leaders..." he pauses for a moment, noticing Quinn's companion for the first time. "Hi," he manages in a tone of voice that suggests he really wants to talk to Quinn alone._

_Obligingly, Quinn gestures to the doctor for her to depart. "That's... uh... an apology?" he holds little hope that it is, but he tries anyway. He knows the questions his government would ask. He's paid to ask them and yet he himself barely understands what has happened. How can he even begin to come to terms with what is going on, if he doesn't know what questions to ask and what answers exist? So, he asks the questions he knows his government would want answers to. Maybe that way, he can work out what to say - to even his own people._

_But where does he stand with _these _people?_

_"Yeah. Hardly." Colonel O'Neill's voice is flat. "You see, we know you're lying through your teeth."_

Quinn closed his eyes, struggling to focus. Isis. The Mother Goddess. Beloved by her people. That didn't sound like a Goa'uld to Quinn. He opened his eyes and thumbed through the notes, hesitating as he found the hieroglyphs depicting Hathor's name, remembering the SGC reports on her. Another Goa'uld who had a well-loved reputation, a reputation born of addiction and lies. Had Isis done something similar?

_The man is angry, and with good reason. Quinn nods wearily. How can he deny that anger in the face of what truly happened? But what can he say? He is Kelownan. He represents Kelowna. He has been raised from birth to defend Kelowna at all costs from her enemies. He does not believe the people of Earth are Kelowna's enemies but he knows in this climate of distrust, tension and cold war, any word he speaks against the stance his government has taken, will be seen as the act of an enemy._

_Part of him wants to be an enemy, if the cost of loyalty is this high. The rest of him though..._

_The rest of him... is afraid._

He frowned, reflecting on the information he had read on the subject of Osiris and Isis. Once a Goa'uld with a reputation for life, healing and wisdom, Isis had been found dead. He scanned the chamber he was in, puzzled. Why on earth would she be found here, in a place that depicted the battle of Ra and Apophis, the eternal war of the sun and the serpent?

She had been a goddess of death, he remembered suddenly. Hovering over the deceased, choosing the dead. A good consort for the King of the Underworld, Osiris. This is how the Tok'ra would have known her, and behind him, he could hear Anise explaining just that. Isis had been a Goa'uld queen who had the power to choose which humans became Jaffa and hosts and which did not. It was in much the same way the SGC reports had revealed Doctor Jackson's own wife had suffered at the hands of Amonet, the queen of Apophis. Just as Apophis had bowed to the wishes of Amonet, Osiris had respected the decisions of Isis.

_He sighs heavily. "How is Doctor Jackson?"_

_The question is polite, nothing more. He already knows the answers. He's seen the consequences for himself. What he doesn't know is whether Doctor Jackson is dead or alive. Whether his suffering has been prolonged, or kept mercifully brief._

_"Not good."_

_Which means he's still alive. Still suffering. He focuses on the Colonel's incredulous reaction and suspects the alien has misinterpreted the reason for the question. Quietly, afraid of saying the wrong thing, he attempts to clarify. "I'm sorry to hear that," and he truly is but again, words are failing him. He's a young man, he has not been in this job long and he is the youngest Kelownan in history to hold the post. Knowledge and intelligence, he is beginning to realise, are poor shadows for experience itself. And right now, he's earning his experience the hard way. He tries to smile but he knows it comes out as a painful grimace instead. "Two of the scientists in that room are already dead. The other two will be shortly. Their deaths were..." he stops. What can he say? No words can convey the horror he felt. The disgust._

_Horror._

_"...horrific." he finishes lamely._

_It's not enough. The words... just aren't enough and, as he looks into O'Neill's eyes, he knows the colonel understands the emotions he's feeling, and feels them himself..._

_... but he also realises, in that moment, that the alien doesn't understand he feels them too. In that moment, he realises, Kelowna has become the enemy to these people and he is the epitome of everything the alien colonel has come to despise in authority. _

_He doesn't know what to do._

So where was all this speculation leading him exactly? He rubbed his forehead wearily, wishing he could push the past behind him enough to concentrate on the present. This place... this place was clearly influenced by the Goa'uld wars that had occurred on Earth, it was the only way to explain why the Tok'ra didn't fully understand what they had found, why their experience could not completely translate what was represented here. He and Teal'c could only interpret what they were seeing now because they had extensive access to Doctor Jackson's vast repository of knowledge but Quinn was beginning to suspect that this time Doctor Jackson's notes weren't going to be enough.

What they needed, he realised bitterly, was Doctor Jackson.

And since that was the one thing they _couldn't_ have, he was going to have to make the best of what he had, and get on with it.

So, he reflected, scanning the room in silence. What would Doctor Jackson do in this situation?

_Walking through the corridors towards the lab where the bomb research is taking place in, his thoughts are a million miles away from his companion's current focus, which is the ancient temple the naquadria was originally found in. "No offence, I'm just more interested in what's out there, through the Stargate."_

_Daniel Jackson eyes him askance as they travel, as if he's not entirely certain how to take that comment. For a moment, he seems amused. "Well," he says, almost wryly. "All I can say is that whatever the problems are between your planet's nations, they will seem insignificant when you do find out what's going on out there."_

Quinn rubbed the back of his neck as he stared at the snake motifs all around the room. He had certainly found out what was "out there", that was for sure. And it had been far bigger, far more wonderful, and far more terrible, than even Doctor Jackson had suggested.

But he had been right about one thing. In seeing how big the universe really was, in the seeing the extent of the troubles - the wars, the alliances, the technology, the suffering, the joy - Quinn had fully realised just how small and vulnerable his planet really was. Kelowna was just a drop in the ocean - Tirania and Andari were so far away from being significant threats in the grand scheme of things that he could have cried with despair at decades - centuries - of wasted mistrust and paranoia. However, he had released those particular tears after the death of Doctor Jackson. After his confession to General Hammond and Colonel O'Neill that his government - the government he had been raised from birth to believe in to the very depths of his soul - had cheered the results of the weapon accident that had cost five men their lives. Four accidentally, the fifth a voluntary sacrifice to save an entire planet of strangers from extinction.

Kelowna's government hadn't cared.

It still didn't.

Tirania and Andari's governments had never known.

They still didn't.

_Quinn regards Jackson with coy frustration, and decides to take a more reasonable approach. That seems to work best with this particular member of SG-1. "Until you give us more details, there's not much else I can do."_

_Jackson accepts the challenge, again with an hint of off-kilter amusement, as if he's wishing he doesn't find any humour in this situation at all. "Well," he explains, and his tone seems slightly cautious, as if he's trying to feel out his response to avoid causing offence. "Whether you've realised it or not, you've probably seen the evidence right here on your own planet. The temple where you found the gate was obviously occupied by a powerful, technologically advanced race. Now, as far as I can tell from the pictures you've shown me, their civilisation was destroyed by a catastrophic explosion."_

_Quinn stares at him, not quite sure what to make of the logic behind Jackson's reasoning. "Our scientists have theorised that an asteroid impacted our continent 10,000 years ago. The fallout from that could have easily buried the civilisation of that time."_

_"Or the race that occupied the gate were experimenting with the very technology you are today and it resulted in disaster."_

_Jackson's words are loaded, carefully structured. There's so much more the alien archaeologist isn't saying. Quinn can sense it but while Jackson guards his words, he can't get to the core of Jackson's reasoning and it frustrates him. He wants to understand but all of this is so far beyond anything he's experienced before - beyond what any Kelownan has experienced before - that he's having to throw out the rule book and play it by ear. "If what you say is true about the potential enemies out there in the galaxy, we may need these advanced weapons more than ever."_

_Jackson's breath escapes in a sound that is half sigh, half laugh and Quinn finally realises the source of his odd amusement. Frustration. "I can't deny that," Jackson agrees. "But some very wise people have shown me first hand how a sudden leap in weapons technology by a civilisation that's not ready for it can lead to its destruction."_

A year ago, Quinn had been an expert in obeying his government's party line and truly believing in the society he had spent his life serving and studying. He had had no experience in conceptualising his planet as a single entity instead of a chaotic trio of volatile nations. Even when he had turned on his government to help SG-1, what Quinn had wanted and how he could express his need was still so far beyond his expertise that he wasn't sure what to do or how to do it.

Quinn hadn't known how to care for his entire planet but somehow... somehow, this past year of living on Earth and travelling through the Stargate to other worlds, had taught him to do exactly that. He had never witnessed a real life act of heroism until SG-1 had visited Kelowna. It had given him the hope that his world could be a better place; that it could have a better future than the tunnelled focus of hostility, war and deceit that it was currently mired in.

But if there was one thing SG-1's arrival and tragic departure had taught him was that being told something wasn't enough. The only way to learn, to truly _know_, was by experience. If he wanted to know what a vision of a better world for his planet could be, he had to experience it for himself or he would never find the words to make his people understand.

_Quinn mulls that over in silence for a few moments. He is listening and he really does want to understand but... there are still things he needs to clarify. "Given the chance, you would deny us this technology?"_

_He glances at Jackson to gauge his response but all he finds is measured calm. "I cannot predict what would happen to your people and your planet with or without the weapon. I just wish there was another way."_

_And that, finally, is something Quinn can understand. The search for better understanding, something beyond what can currently be seen or felt, the sense that what is currently known isn't the whole picture, it's not the big picture, it's just a tiny strand in a huge tapestry that frustratingly lies just out of sight._

_Just as he thinks he's beginning to understand what Doctor Jackson is beginning to say... the air explodes and time runs out._

The big picture.

A light-bulb flashed into life in the depths of his mind. There it was, the seed that Teal'c had nudged into life within his mind. The instinct, the memory, he had been grasping so desperately for.

"Hey! Earth to Jonas Quinn!"

Quinn jumped like a startled cat as Colonel O'Neill yelled into his ear. The Kelownan turned sharply to regard him in shock and suddenly realised that every person in the room was staring at him with unsettling curiosity. "Colonel?" he asked, a little confused. How long had people been trying to grab his attention?

"Sheesh, Jonas, what planet were you on?!" O'Neill demanded irritably.

"Mine," he admitted honestly, swinging back to stare at the sun disk with a frown, his brain moving into high gear.

O'Neill stared at him. "Why?" he asked. His tone was a distinctive half-exasperated disbelief that the Kelownan had eventually learned to interpret as the Colonel's attempt to decide whether he should be angry or concerned.

That fateful day on Kelowna, it had been Colonel O'Neill who had managed to break down, into simple terms, the stark reality of what Doctor Jackson had been trying to say. He had left Quinn shaken and disturbed but his impact had been immediate and lasting.

What he had failed to do was understand it hadn't been Jackson's only point. There had been another point to the archaeologist's speech, another lesson to be learned. One that Quinn had sensed back then but which only now made sense.

"I was just thinking of something Doctor Jackson told me."

_That day._

He didn't need to say when. O'Neill had stiffened with understanding the moment he spoke the words. "What?" the Colonel asked, a little more harshly than he had intended.

Quinn didn't answer immediately, he was searching for the words, the best way to express something that was little more than intangible awareness. "He was saying, I think, that it's a good thing to see, and understand, the big picture, as long the little details aren't forgotten."

O'Neill stared at him, baffled. "And that's relevant, how?" he demanded.

The Kelownan began to grin. By nature, he possessed a glass-half-full personality and while he had moments when he would despair and lose heart, he couldn't be held down for long. "We're missing the point," he gestured expansively at the room. "Of this... of everything here," he began shoving his notes back into his pack. "I need to get back to basics," he explained cheerfully.

A short time ago, he had wondered in frustration what Jackson would do in this situation. And now Quinn thought he knew.

Doctor Jackson would start at the beginning.

And the beginning, Quinn realised, wasn't here in this room but on the surface with a stone door through which only the Chosen of the Gods could pass. Shouldering his pack, he bolted out of the room before SG-1 or the Tok'ra could stop him.

For the first time in a year, Jonas Quinn felt time stir and begin to march.


	18. Counterbalance

**Chapter 18**

There was a strange silence lingering over the base. In part, it was due to the fact it was almost midnight and many of the personnel had either departed for the day or were fast asleep. However, since his arrival here, Daniel Jackson had become used to the idea that the SGC never slept: in this place, there was always someone awake, somewhere; there was always activity.

Tension had been hovering in the air for much of the day. He had been able to sense it even though he had spent much of the day hiding away in his private quarters rummaging through his storage trunk. He didn't know the cause but he had concluded one thing. The silence wasn't peace; it was the calm before the storm.

Making a conscious decision to stay out of everyone's way, Jackson had decided to go through the trunk in depth and see if there was anything else that triggered his memories, or helped put the memories that had returned into some kind of perspective. Nothing did but instead of frustration and disappointment, he felt relief.

He was still unsettled by his encounter with the Egyptian scales in the archaeology labs. The memories he had been able to piece together had told him everything he needed to know about his past and confirmed one of his worst fears: that he was the kind of man he couldn't be proud of. What he didn't understand was why the SGC had been so determined to bring him home, to help him rebuild his life: if he was the kind of person that didn't deserve respect, what did that say about the morals of the people at this base?

He was starting to question the true motives behind SG-1's decision to bring him here.

He sighed at the direction his thoughts were travelling in and let his gaze linger on a silvery greyish-green bowl that was sitting on the table in front of him. Most of the items he had pulled out of the trunk had been memorabilia, Egyptian artefacts, or masks and instruments of some kind. A gut instinct had told him that most of these objects were African in origin, and not just Egyptian, but he had not managed to shake free any specific memories of how he had come to own them, or what significance any of it had to his past.

This bowl, however, was different. It didn't seem to belong with the others. It was metal instead of wood and, when he investigated the inside more closely, it occurred to him that it might have been made of several different kinds of metal, all carefully shaped into a single crescent-moon that fit quite comfortably into the palm of his hand. On the outside, the bowl had been fairly plain but inside, a simple circle was inscribed into the centre. Within the bowl, had rested a wooden mallet and a thick wooden stick that, oddly, resembled a baseball bat. Jackson wasn't entirely sure what they were for but they were clearly connected to the bowl in some way. In the end, puzzled and intrigued, he had taken the bowl to the archaeology labs in an attempt to identify what on earth it was for.

"Burning the midnight oil?"

The voice was soft and broke through his wavering concentration like a beam of sunlight bursting through closed curtains. He looked up in surprise to find Doctor Fraiser standing a few feet away. Almost instinctively, his gaze dropped to her feet. She was wearing heels and yet he hadn't heard her approach at all.

"Mind if I sit down for a bit?"

His attention snapped back to her face but there was nothing threatening in her expression and a kind twinkle in her dark eyes. With the exception of Major Feretti, the only other human being on this entire base that he had felt any sort of connection to had been this doctor. He had no reason to mistrust her and, just as with Feretti, most of his instincts told him she was on his side.

When he shook his head and gestured to an empty seat, the smile she shot him was dazzling. "You look busy," she commented, her eyes on the bowl. "May I?" She didn't touch it until he nodded and then reached forward and lifted it gently into her hands, studying it with obvious and, he realised in surprise, genuine curiosity.

"It was in my trunk," he suddenly found himself telling her. "It's... I don't know what it is."

She looked up and studied his face intently for a moment then returned her attention to it. "Do you know what culture it's from?"

He shook his head slowly. "I have no idea," he looked at the books piled on the table with him. "In the end, I just started with the letter A and went from there."

She grinned wryly. "Let's hope the answer doesn't come under the letter Z," she told him with a smile.

He flashed her an answering smile and felt some of the frustration ease out of his body. As with Feretti, he could feel himself beginning to relax as he realised Doctor Fraiser was able to reach beyond his amnesia to speak directly to him. He was tired of being defined by his lack of memory and the helplessness and vulnerability that came from knowing that a building full of strangers knew more about him than he did. Feretti and Fraiser were the only two people on the base who allowed him the opportunity to drop his guard and, it wasn't until he was talking to them, that he realised just how exhausting his entire experience was proving to be.

"What's this?" Fraiser's soft voice pulled him back from his thoughts to refocus on her. She had placed the bowl back down on the table and was investigating the mallet and stick that were both lying alongside it.

"They seem to come with the bowl," he explained uncertainly. "I'm not sure why."

"Well..." Fraiser mused thoughtfully. She studied the two objects in her hand intently for a moment then regarded the bowl. Suddenly, she leaned forward, readjusted her hold on the mallet, and struck the side of the bowl gently before Jackson could stop her.

The sound that rang out from the struck bowl was louder than either of them had expected it to be. A mixture of different tones - at least seven that Jackson could identify - oscillated together, rippling out like a wave that rose into a crescendo before dying back into a gentle resonance that made their ears hum and their skin tingle. There was the strangest sense of a heartbeat vibrating in the once still air that seemed to resound within the depths of their chests, finding answering rhythms within their own hearts. For several minutes, neither of them spoke, staring in silence as the bowl continued to hum with a multitude of rich harmonic overtones that swelled and ebbed until they eventually faded away into nothing.

"Wow," Fraiser breathed at last. "Daniel, it sounds like a _bell_."

Jackson didn't answer immediately. His skin was still tingling and somewhere in the back of his mind, he could feel his memories buzzing like a cloud of angry gnats - trying to find focus but failing. He stared at the mallet in Fraiser's hands then he cautiously picked up the baseball bat-shaped stick and studied it.

"Why did you do that?" he whispered at last.

Her eyes lifted to find his. For a moment she didn't speak, her dark gaze searching his face in silence. Eventually, she seemed to find what she was looking for, although he had no idea what that something was. "It was a mallet, Daniel," she whispered just as softly. "Mallets hit things."

He gazed at her for a moment more, then dropped his gaze to the stick in his hands. Baseball bats were designed to hit things as well but something told him the shape was nothing more than a coincidence, that if it was meant to strike the bowl, it would also have been shaped like a mallet. He sighed and dropped the stick into the bowl and closed his books, feeling strangely lethargic.

"Daniel?" she leaned forward slightly. "How are you feeling?"

It was the question of the day, he realised. He was tired, of that he had no doubt. It was as if everything in his entire life had become a struggle. The simplest things were almost alien to him. Sometimes he could feel himself going through motions that his body clearly recognised and his mind would wage war to either reject what his body was doing or to understand why he somehow knew the things he did. He had long since passed frustration and entered into a no-man's land where he was on the verge of accepting his fate if it only meant a single hour of peace from the confusion that engulfed his mind. He hadn't sprung into life on this earth fully grown but sometimes that was exactly what it felt like.

"Why are you doing this?" he heard himself ask the question before he had even realised he was thinking it.

Fraiser didn't answer immediately. Eventually, he lifted his eyes to her face and found her gazing thoughtfully at him with an intense expression in her dark eyes. "Why am I doing what, Daniel?" the doctor asked him quietly when he met her gaze.

"Why are you trying to save me?"

A faint smile flitted across the CMO's features. The question hadn't surprised her, he realised and he was suddenly faced with the unsettling notion that while he was struggling to read her mind, she had no such difficulty with his. "Why do you ask?" was all she said, her voice nearly a whisper.

"Janet," he said slowly, leaning forward. "I have a memory," he fell silent for a moment, trying to decide how to word what he wanted to say - but he didn't drop her gaze. This was important, he realised. He didn't know why but he knew he had to make her understand the depth of what he was currently feeling. It occurred to him that maybe she already understood, because her gaze was equally unwavering even as he paused to gather his thoughts.

He took a slow, deep breath. "I'm lying in a room," he said softly at last. "In darkness. My hands and my legs are bound to the bed I'm lying on. I'm a prisoner, Janet. There's somewhere else I need to be. A... uh... a woman... that I need to be with," he swallowed. "And she's not my wife," he paused as something he couldn't translate flitted across her features but the expression didn't linger on her face and she gave no indication she wanted to interrupt him, so he struggled on. "Light explodes into my room as the door opens and I close my eyes. My captor has come and I close my eyes so they can't see that I'm awake. The restraints don't hold me properly. I know this, I've been working at freeing myself from them for a while, but I know... that _they_ don't know. So... when my captor leans over me, I open my eyes and..."

He stopped. She raised her eyebrows at his pause but was silent and he knew she was aware of what he was going to say next, he could tell she was remembering it too. "And I was looking into your face, Janet. But I didn't care... because I grabbed you. Around the throat, I think, and I threw you across the room. You hit the wall, Janet..." he trailed off. "So hard," he whispered and saw her flinch at the memory of the impact. "But I didn't care. There was a guard with you, and I hit him. Even when he collapsed... I kept hitting him. I hurt him so much. And... and Janet," he whispered softly. "I _enjoyed _it."

He stopped. Silently, he stared at her. Just as silently, she stared right back. He didn't know if stubbornness motivated her or something else but she wasn't giving in to what he was trying to say; she was determined to outstare him. "So, I ask you again, Doctor," he said quietly. "Why are you trying to save me?"

Fraiser finally dropped his gaze and looked away, studying the corner of the table as if it could somehow bring her inspiration on what to say next. He watched as her gaze drifted across the table, over the strange bowl and across the books to rest on his hands, clasped so tightly in front of them both but she was completely silent, as if she had nothing at all to say.

At last, she reached out and deliberately, gently, enfolded his hands into her own tiny, but powerful, grip. "The best way I know how to answer that question," she began softly, still watching his hands, "is to tell you about something that happened to me a few years ago," her gaze lifted abruptly to pierce his eyes with a determined stare. "If you'll let me, that is."

Silenced by the fierceness that he could sense within the tiny doctor, he nodded dumbly. She smiled faintly in response and seemed to relax slightly. "Alright," she said softly, dropping her gaze back down to their clasped hands. She took a deep breath. "I'm an army brat," she began. "My father was in the Air Force, his father before him, my older brothers. I was raised hearing stories about men who fought and died for their country, protecting what they believed in. I was raised hearing the stories of heroes, Daniel. It made me so proud to be related to these men, so determined to give something back... just like they had. So, I joined the Air Force too."

The doctor fell silent for several long moments, her gaze distant, a faint smile on her face as if she was lost in memories that were pleasant to her. Jackson felt a slight stab of jealousy that she could linger in the past so easily when he had to fight for every scrap of memory he possessed but he didn't break the silence. She had allowed him to speak without interruption now he owed her the same courtesy.

"But you know the funny thing, Daniel? I never really met one - a real hero, that is. A few years ago, I was recruited by the Pentagon and assigned here, to the SGC, during an outbreak of a contagious disease," she smiled ruefully. "I knew I was recruited because of my speciality in infectious diseases but I had no idea, until I arrived here, that the contagion afflicting the SGC was of alien origin. That was a little outside even my expertise."

She was silent again, her expression reflective for a moment before she continued. "While I was here, I met a man... he had been brought in suffering from blunt trauma. It wasn't life threatening but it was painful. He was rude to me - abrasive, impatient, arrogant... even condescending," she smiled faintly. "It wasn't a great first impression but then... then I learned that he had been beaten up by his best friend, who had been infected by this disease. The only way we could find a cure was to send people back to the hot spot - the source of the contagion itself. And this man, who I had disliked on first sight, volunteered without a second thought," her eyes lifted without warning to lock onto his. "He was willing to walk into the lion's den to save his friend, to save the SGC, for the _chance_ to prevent this disease contaminating our entire planet. He didn't even think about the risk to himself, he just went - because it was the right thing to do. And that day, Daniel, I realised I'd come face to face with my first hero."

Jackson watched her in silence, transfixed by something implacable in the stare she had focused on him. He started to speak but she raised a finger sharply, frowning slightly. She hadn't finished and she was demanding his silence until she had. He subsided. He didn't know how this was relevant to the question he had asked but it was clear she wanted his patience so he could find out. "Anyway, my position here was made permanent after that and I came to realise that here... this place... it was the front line, Daniel, it was all that stood between the evil out there in the galaxy and the safety of everyone on Earth. Every single day, a new hero was born," her gaze drifted away from his face. "And an old hero died," she swallowed and fell silent again, allowing the implications of that to sink in.

"This man I mentioned?" she continued quietly. "The one I originally didn't like? I found out he was working with the man who kidnapped his own wife," her gaze turned back to rest on Jackson's face. "Can you imagine that? I couldn't. I couldn't wrap my head around it for months, not until I realised something: the man who had kidnapped his wife had been a prisoner, even a slave. He had felt, in his heart, all the wrongs his master inflicted... but he knew of no way to oppose it. It was the SGC who gave him that way and he embraced it whole-heartedly, without looking back. He had to turn his back on his people, his wife, his son, to walk this path - but he did it willingly, just for the _chance_ to right the wrongs of his past and save his people. And the man who had lost his wife to him... that man was one of the first to give him a second chance. And to this day, Daniel, that faith has never been betrayed."

"And these people are heroes?" Jackson asked, his voice barely a mumble of confusion.

Fraiser studied him for a moment then smiled, seeing the unasked question. He still couldn't see where she was going with this, how this was relevant to the question he had asked. She forged onwards. "Yes, they are, Daniel," she contemplated what she was saying for a moment before continuing. "No-one here is perfect, Daniel. We all make mistakes; we have all done things we're not proud of. But all of us have friends here, we all have people who recognise that when we make fools of ourselves, we can be redeemed. Has anyone explained to you what the Goa'uld are?"

Jackson blinked, the sudden question startling him. He stared at her for a moment then closed his eyes, focusing his mind. "Parasites that inhabit the bodies of humans. The human is a prisoner to the whims of the parasite and..." he swallowed. "Although the Goa'uld is absolute evil, the host is a victim of the Goa'uld's demands," he opened his eyes and studied Fraiser solemnly. "I'm not sure how much of this I remember and how much I have been told but... I understand how evil they are," he sighed. "I remember... at least, I think I remember... my wife was turned into one and that the things she did... were not her fault," the look he cast Fraiser was almost appealing, as if looking for vindication that his belief, his memory, was right.

The CMO smiled sympathetically. "Yes. But Daniel, most people can't see the difference between the host and the Goa'uld. Most people never _see_ the Goa'uld. It's the actions of the host people see and that's what people remember," she stopped for a moment then squeezed his hands before continuing. "We actually captured one once," she returned her attention to his face. "He was the former master of the recruit I mentioned, the same Goa'uld who had claimed the wife of my friend for his own mate. He was dying and he threw himself on our mercy," a soft snort of disbelief escaped her nostrils. "He hoped he could bargain with us for a new host... and we held him as a prisoner of war..."

For the first time she lifted one hand from the grip she had been maintaining on his hands to run her fingers through her hair. "I'm a doctor, Daniel. And sometimes what I have to do as a doctor is... at odds with what I have to do as an Air Force officer," she looked at Jackson and her expression was as solemn as his had been only moments before. "I wanted respect for that host, Daniel, respect its Goa'uld slaver had never granted it. I was so surprised to find the person agreeing me was the husband of the wife this Goa'uld had stolen," she smiled wearily at the bemused archaeologist and looked down at the table as she returned her hands to enfold his once more. "I don't know why I was surprised, given his past history. Do you know this man had been kidnapped once, by an alien who tortured him for information on Earth's past?"

Jackson's eyes narrowed. He could barely remember to what she was referring but he wasn't stupid. He could feel his memories clamouring for attention in the back of his mind, restlessly nudging him with instinct rather than detail. He was beginning to see where she was going with this speech. He was struggling to believe the implications but he was beginning to understand the point she was trying to make.

"This alien's wife had disappeared, her fate unknown, and it had realised its prisoner was the only one who might have knowledge of what had happened to her. He made the SGC think our man was dead to buy him the time he needed to gain the information. This man, his prisoner, risked his very sanity to help the alien find what he was looking for - because he understood the loss the alien felt, because he had lost his own wife to the Goa'uld and he empathised with the alien's pain. When the two parted company... they parted as friends," she smiled sadly at Daniel. "Do you know how amazing that is?"

Jackson gazed silently at her. Something had settled into the pit of his stomach like a leaden weight. It was fear, he realised, a terrible, aching fear. He didn't understand what it was within her speech that had triggered it but it was beginning to gnaw at him like a hungry rat.

"Our man died eventually," Fraiser continued softly, her face lined with remembered pain. "He spent years sacrificing himself for others and eventually... well, eventually it caught up to him. A group from the SGC travelled to a new planet. The inhabitants were in the grip of a cold war. They were developing bombs, Daniel, but they made mistakes and the experiment they performed for the visitors went wrong. It should have destroyed an entire continent, Daniel. This man though..." she forced a smile but there was nothing humorous in the gesture, it was almost a grimace. "He physically stepped in to stop the bomb before it could blow. He saved a planet full of strangers, most of who didn't even know he existed. The effort, Daniel... it killed him," she swallowed. "Do you know what death by radiation poisoning is like?" she whispered.

He stared at her. He did know. He could remember his own death and he was well aware she knew he could remember it. But he hadn't been able to remember why it had happened, what had led to the pain, the sense of boiling from the inside out, of slowly drowning in his own blood...

_Somewhere through the flames engulfing his body, he feels a single moment of cool relief. A gentle caress along his shoulder that brings a moment of peace within the war zone that his body has become, the voice of an angel reaching through the nightmare to soothe his soul._

_"You have an effect on people, Daniel." _

He swallowed thickly and turned quickly away, finally understanding why her speech was frightening him. He didn't want her to see how much the memory affected him, he didn't want to be dragged down to the infirmary to answer invasive questions from a psychiatrist he was struggling to trust. He knew it was a lost cause when he realised he was shaking. She was still clinging to his hands, there was no way she could fail to notice he was trembling.

_"The way you look at things. It changed me too."_

"Daniel?" Her voice was soft but there was a slight edge to it, a hint of command that drew his gaze back to her and he was surprised to see tears in her eyes.

"Janet..." he said very slowly, his voice rough with fear. "I'm not the person you... everyone here... remembers."

_"I see what really matters."_

He might have said more but her choked laugh halted him. It was a strange mixture of pain, disbelief and genuine humour. "Oh God, Daniel," she managed. "Do you know the last memory anyone has of you?" She didn't wait for his response but continued on regardless, her voice shaking. "Abydos, the planet your wife came from? It was in danger, Daniel - just a few short months ago, a year after your death. The Ascended aren't allowed to help the mortal world but Abydos needed help... and you knew that. You broke all the rules, Daniel, just for the _chance_ to save that world," she hesitated, staring into his uncomprehending eyes. "Death didn't change the person you were, Daniel. You're here, now, because you _are_ the person we remember. I believe that, Daniel. Major Feretti believes that. SG-1 brought you home because _they_ believe it too," she sucked in a deep breath and he could feel her trembling just as he was. "You've been so busy saving the galaxy, Daniel, don't you think it's time the galaxy saved you back?"

_"God, I don't know why we wait to tell people how we really feel."_

He stared at her in silence. He didn't know what to say. What she was telling him was so different to what he could currently remember, he didn't even know if he should believe her. But when he looked into her eyes, at the conviction that burned there like a fire and felt her hands grip his like bands of steel, he found himself wavering, his doubt losing strength. It was hard to look her in the eye, to see that passion, and to wonder if she was lying.

_"I guess I hoped that you always knew."_

Maybe, he dared to speculate, it was just possible that he didn't need to remember. Maybe it was enough that other people did.


	19. Queen of Thrones

**Chapter 19**

Not for the first time, Colonel O'Neill found himself wondering why on earth scientists were allowed off world. They were often trapped in their own little fantasies; they never made any sense; their goals were often at odds with the military purpose of a mission; and, most annoyingly of all, they had magpie-complexes: if knowledge sparkled, then they were easily distracted by shiny things.

Apparently, the grand truth of the galaxy was that a nerd was a nerd was a nerd - no matter what planet he came from.

"Jonas," he said irritably, scanning the forest trail they had originally used to escape the mountains. "Tell me again why we're risking our butts out here?"

The Kelownan was busy juggling his notes as he fought to translate the stone door of the underground complex, a pen hanging out of his mouth and a focused scowl on his face. He looked up, grabbing the pen, clearly planning on answering that question but O'Neill raised a hand abruptly.

"Make it _good_," he added flatly.

"There's got to be a reason why this place became the domain of Isis, Colonel," Quinn responded eagerly. "I just need to understand--"

"No!" O'Neill gesticulated emphatically with his hands. "No, Jonas! Just... _no_!"

The Kelownan historian gazed at him in mild reproach and O'Neill felt his temper hike several more degrees at the expression. He had put up with this for over five years from Daniel Jackson. Having had to endure it for the past twelve months from Jonas Quinn as well had been a nightmare.

"This isn't a sight-seeing tour, Jonas," he snapped. "It's a rescue mission. We were supposed to get in, get the Tok'ra, get out and be home in time to watch the Simpsons! Now we're up to our necks in Jaffa, who _are_ going to discover us if we stay here much longer, I want you working out how to read that damn gate, not tell me why a bunch of snakes are painted onto a wall!"

Jonas glanced passed the angry Colonel to study Major Carter's face. She looked tense and wary but there was also a hint of sympathy in the glance she returned. He turned his attention back to O'Neill. "Sir," he said patiently. "According to what Doctor Jackson wrote, Isis was a goddess who possessed great knowledge. More knowledge than any other Goa'uld, in fact. Her name meant 'Queen of the Throne' - she was responsible for the power the rulers wielded; she knew the secrets of the universe; Colonel, she was even called the Lady of the Words of Power..."

He trailed off as he saw O'Neill's nostrils flare in frustration. Before either of them could speak, however, Carter inserted herself smoothly into the conversation.

"Okay, Jonas," she said calmly. "Isis was an important Goa'uld but how is that going to help us understand this Stargate?"

"Right," Quinn waved his pen at her and began digging through his notes. "Right here, look," he twisted the notebook around so they could both see it. The scrawl across the page was, for the most part, in Doctor Jackson's hand but every so often, Quinn had added a few notations of his own, clarifying or expanding something the original owner had written.

There was an image drawn onto the page, something that looked, to Carter's untrained eye, awfully like a rather fat, twisted and broken ankh. Quinn tapped it with his pen. "There? You see that?" he exclaimed. His eyes darted between the pair of them and his enthusiasm dampened only slightly when he realised they were still confused. "How about this?" With the pen, he drew a line through the middle of the image, effectively cutting it in half.

"Oh my," Carter breathed, staring. "Sir!" she exclaimed, turning on the thoroughly bemused Colonel. "You remember the two halves of the master control crystal that Anise found in the Hall of Apophis?"

"Yeah, the broken thing, that _might_ work the gate. If we're lucky," O'Neill muttered.

"Yes sir," Carter gestured to the notebook. "Well, that's what the crystals will look like when put together."

"That thing?" O'Neill peered at the now defaced notebook image. "Okay, none of us have ever heard of a DHD as whacked out as the one we've got on this planet, let alone a master control crystal shaped like a squashed gingerbread man. So what's a picture of it doing in one of Daniel's old notebooks? I know for sure he wasn't psychic, even if he did always like to think he should be."

"It's called a tyet," Quinn explained quickly. "It's known as the Knot of Isis. To the Ancient Egyptians, knots held great power and few knots held anything like the power of the Knot of Isis," he glanced down at the image in the book. "According to Ancient Egyptians, the Knot of Isis was a red stone or glass and sometimes called the Blood of Isis as a result. Egyptologists assumed that meant it was made out of carnelian or something else familiar to people from Earth."

"But they could have been describing the master control crystal?" Carter speculated, her eyes gleaming.

Quinn excitedly waved the notebook at her. "There was a belief among Egyptologists that the ankh was regarded as some kind of key that unlocked the gate of death - and the tyet is related to the ankh but possibly with a much older origin that predates Egyptian civilisation. Which means it might originally come from a culture other than the Goa'uld."

Carter chuckled at that. "Well, considering ancient humans buried the Stargate after the defeat of Ra to prevent his return, they must have felt like it had become a 'gate of death'."

"Exactly," the Kelownan smiled. "Maybe the belief even stemmed from a memory of _this_ Stargate instead of the one on Earth. Isis did have a role in selecting the dead, maybe she brought them here to do that?"

O'Neill shuddered at the enjoyment the pair seemed to take at discussing this subject. Personally, he could take it or leave it. As long as he could get the bottom line out of all this babble, he'd be happy. Right now, however, he was struck by something much more immediate. "Doesn't look much like a knot to me," he observed blandly.

"Well, no," Quinn agreed patiently. "But that's what it is," he tucked the pen into the page as a impromptu bookmark and closed the book. "Colonel, I don't know what the symbols on the gate mean and the Tok'ra don't have a clue either. But, sir, I think Isis _did_. I think that's why her presence is all around that throne room. She set up a base here, not Ra or Apophis - on Earth, snakes were associated with Isis too, not just the sun disk," he gestured to the imagery on the stone door. "Somewhere in these chambers, there has to be a clue about how to work the Stargate," he tapped the notebook emphatically. "Colonel, she _knew_ how to work this Stargate, I'm certain of it - and if she knew, she might have left a record here that we could use."

He took a deep breath. "It's the best plan I've got."

O'Neill looked slowly around the clearing. He threw the forest trail another nervous stare before turning back to gaze at the stone door. "Carter, how many chambers have we found so far in this place?"

"Uh... I think we're up to ten, sir," Carter replied immediately. "Teal'c has investigated more of them than we have."

He nodded slowly and let his dark eyes drift to Quinn's hopeful face. "So, let me get this straight. You want to translate every glyph on this stone door and in ten - maybe more - underground rooms just in case a dead Goa'uld left instructions on how to use this planet's Stargate... and that's the best plan you've got?"

The Kelownan grinned and nodded.

O'Neill eyed the grin, a sour expression on his face. "Ya know, Jonas, it's really annoying how you get more cheerful the worse things are."

Quinn chuckled. "Just looking at the bright side, sir,"

"There's a bright side?" the Colonel looked incredulous.

"Oh yes," was the earnest reply. "We finally have a chance of translating the Stargate!"

O'Neill stared at him for several moments. "Oh yeah," he muttered. "Things are really looking up!"

"Hey guys," Jacob poked his head around the door. "Everything okay out here?"

"Oh, couldn't be better," O'Neill said sarcastically, heading back into the underground complex. "We have a _chance_ of translating the Stargate now!"

"That's good news, Jack," Jacob replied.

The Colonel glared at the Tok'ra as if offended by Jacob's upbeat tone and stalked off past him, disappearing into the gloom beyond.

"Did I say something?" the Tok'ra asked Sam blandly.

His daughter chuckled and shook her head. "Dad, if we're going to get this Stargate translated, we're going to need everything Anise's team has on the hieroglyphics in this place. Jonas thinks the answer lies with them."

"You better come inside then," Jacob said. "Sin saw a small army of Jaffa heading in this direction from the window in the throne room. It's not safe---"

He trailed off, interrupted by the abrupt howl of a Jaffa hunting horn. Moments later, several others took up the cry. The sound reverberated around the doline they were standing in as if the warriors were merely yards away.

"Inside! Now!" Selmak hissed in obvious alarm and too surprised to debate it, Quinn and Carter obeyed the symbiote immediately. They paused only long enough to make sure the door was completely sealed and heard the sound of hurried footsteps behind them as O'Neill raced back to their location, gun in hand.

"How close?" he demanded hoarsely.

"We didn't wait around to find out, let's get back to the others," Jacob set off at a flat run, the three humans hot on his heels.

When they burst into the throne room, they found the three Tok'ra packing up all of their equipment with an attitude of carefully controlled panic.

"Have they found us?" Anise demanded as soon as she noticed their return.

"I do not believe so," Teal'c was standing near the base of the steps that led to the window, his body as still as stone, head tilted slightly and a look of intense concentration on his face as he listened to the horns. "The Jaffa are training, learning how to co-ordinate their tactics by sound when sight cannot be relied upon."

That news didn't seem to reassure the Tok'ra. "Then if they're concentrating on training for the hunt they will be looking for tracks to follow," Sin said severely.

"And will most likely find the trails we left," Ilithya was frowning as well.

"We must leave now, before we are trapped inside this complex," Anise agreed and her attention suddenly turned to Jacob.

"I fear we already are," Selmak replied slowly. "The horns sounded very close to the entrance. I would not recommend we attempt to leave until the Jaffa have left this area."

"Which will be...?" Anise demanded.

Selmak didn't respond, instead he looked directly at the only Jaffa in the room.

"If this terrain proves challenging, the Jaffa will not depart for many hours," Teal'c replied simply.

"And what if they find us?"

Teal'c gave the Tok'ra scientist a cool stare. "Then we will fight or die."

"We will most certainly die!" Ilithya exclaimed. "We are trapped and outnumbered!"

"Alright, alright," O'Neill flung up his hands, which incidentally still held his P-90. Achieving the effect he wanted, which was everyone's attention as they nervously eyed his gun waving, he continued on in his best command tone. "T, can you tell from the horns how many Jaffa are likely to be out there. Roughly?"

"A moment, O'Neill," Teal'c turned back to the window, closing his eyes, his brow furrowing slightly as he listened to the distant activity intently. The seconds dragged by in silence, pierced only by the restless fidgeting of Sin and Anise as they waited impatiently for the Jaffa's response. Outside, the horns continued to blow and, if anything, seemed to be coming closer rather than moving away. "I detect five horns, O'Neill," Teal'c said at last. "There is normally one horn for five Jaffa."

"Right," the Colonel said in a crisp tone. "Let's assume for the moment that we're outnumbered three to one. We've got the entrance and the tunnels wired and we know this complex better than they do. Carter, did you identify any place we could blow ourselves a new exit if it comes to it?"

"Yes sir," the Major replied. "But it'll give away our location so I don't recommend it unless we're out of options. Dad did say the Tok'ra have a couple of those tunnel-making crystals on hand if we need them."

"Not many," Selmak added firmly. "Enough for a short, emergency tunnel but no more. This is an option we cannot afford to rely on."

O'Neill nodded. "Alright, people, listen up," he ordered. "This is what we're gonna do. Jonas, you bring Anise and her lot up to speed on your theory. Find the information you need to get that blasted gate working. You're out of time, so work fast. We'll worry about how to get to the gate when we know if we can use the damn thing. Jacob, you're with the rest of us. We need to find a room we can defend - one Carter can blow to hell or you can tunnel us out of if we have to run. I want somewhere we can hole up in without getting trapped."

They all stared at him.

"Any questions?" he demanded.

"What theory?" Anise demanded, staring at Quinn.

"Any _important_ questions?" O'Neill snapped impatiently.

The Tok'ra archaeologist's eyes flashed furiously.

"Anise," Selmak said softly. "We have no time for this. Jonas Quinn will explain everything you need to know," he turned to O'Neill. "There are no questions, Colonel."

O'Neill eyed the other three Tok'ra, not liking the expressions on their faces as they stared at Selmak. The ancient Tok'ra gazed silently back at his peers. His tone had been unmistakable - his confirmation had been more a command to his fellow Tok'ra to obey the humans for now than to reassure O'Neill.

"Right, people," O'Neill snapped. "Let's get to work!" He headed off deeper into the complex but felt a prickle of unease snake its way down his spine. He wasn't worried about the Tok'ra obeying him - the snakeheads had got obeying self-preservation instincts down to a fine art and right now, even they knew O'Neill's expertise was their best chance of survival.

No, what he was instead suddenly worried about was how long it would be before they stopped obeying _Selmak_.

The last thing they needed was dissent in the ranks but now every military instinct the Colonel possessed told him that he might find more trouble amongst his allies than out there among his enemies. Leaving the Tok'ra to Quinn in the throne-room, he indicated for Teal'c to take point then tried to ignore the pressure building up behind his eyes as he whispered a silent promise that he hoped was more paranoia than premonition.

_So help me, God. If the Tok'ra do anything stupid that screws us over, I'll damn well shoot them myself._


End file.
